Stop the beeping

A friend of mine told me a story the other day. he was in a thrift shop and he asked to see an inkwell.

The young man behind the counter handed him a sculpture. "No," he said, "I want to see the inkwell," pointing at the antique object. He inspected the vessel, then handed it back to the man and departed.

The next day he re-entered the thrift shop. This time a girl was behind the counter. "I would like to see the inkwell," he once again proclaimed. The girl handed him the sculpture once again.

"I said the inkwell." The girl looked at him strangely and finally said, "What's an inkwell?" "Well, it is a vessel that holds ink that you put a brush, quill or nib into when you are drawing. I don't mean to pry but how do you not know what an inkwell is?

And the girl answered that if she needed to know about anything she could always google it.

*

I am not going to get into another extended rant on cultural illiteracy or the reverse Flynn effect. My blood pressure is already high enough. But it does seem that many of us over rely on these stupid phones and computers for the most basic of tasks, like addition or subtraction for instance, and it is not too hard to conceive of some harm they may be doing to our basic beings.

I am sure that all of us have friends, family or acquaintances that would rather hang out in cyberland 24/7 than take a walk or talk to their real life peeps. Living for likes on Facebook. Pretty awful metric but what do I know? Or staying up all night playing Fortnite or some warcraft game. I am off all social media at the moment except this blog and it feels pretty good. Especially with all the new info breaking about how Facebook really feels about the sanctity and privacy of your data, communications and email contacts.

Anyhow, not to draw this out but I did something very simple today to strike a blow for sanity on my cheap Motorola cell phone.

I'll take my chances

I went into every application and I turned off the notifications. Because I don't want to hear a beep every time CNN wants to tell me about a new chapter in the Mueller Report, or Huffpo wants to dish on Kaitlyn Jenner or CVS wants to tell me that my prescription is ready.

I don't want to be forced to rate every internet communication with my bank, or tell somebody what I really thought about the check in at the hotel. My time is valuable and I would like to reclaim it. So is my mental health. The emails can wait and so can the text messages. I will engage at a level I am comfortable with, and it is about me, my time schedule, not Yelp, not Instagram, not anybody else. If I need to engage I can surely find you, but stop with the incessant notifications already. It's driving us all batshit crazy.

Gene Clark

Richmond Bridge

I wonder who?

Eagle flies

I'm back from my trip up north. It was far less productive than I had hoped for and I don't think I have the emotional strength for a full internet post mortem right now. Too tired, too bummed. Did have some good times, good food and good talks with old friends.

Sunday morning Warmboe asked me to drive up to the Richmond Bridge with him. He had seen a pair of osprey nesting up there. I saw the nest but getting a shot from the second lane (right lane was closed) through the bridge railing, going seventy miles an hour was a fairly impossible task. We tried twice.

I did see a nice jubea chilensis palm tree at the east end of the bridge in a palm yard. So beautiful. My favorite palm, the sight of one always puts a smile on my face.

Went back to the show afterwards, did a little business and  finally packed out, tail resting firmly between my legs. The defeats are getting more and more crushing, not sure that I am emotionally equipped for a steady diet of failure.

I usually come home Monday but I stayed an extra day. Dave has been pretty sick and our old college roommate Jeff was flying in from North Carolina to spend some time with him. I haven't seen or heard from Jeff in twenty years but we were the three musketeers in our younger days, both in Cardiff and on the Grateful Dead tour. At least that is the name Rick Griffin gave us.

Dave and Jeff both of course cleaned up and grew up, had families, became very successful. I did my thing, whatever that is, hung around Terrapin Station, made rust.

The three of us and Dave's wife Amy went out for a meal Monday night. The excellent Bistro Aix. Porterhouse for four, I could have easily polished it off by myself. But the meal was delicious, nonetheless. The owner, John Beard, is a wonderful chef, a good friend of Dave's and a very nice guy.

It was good to see Jeff, everybody reminisced about past debauchery and collective experiences and had a good time. Jeff graciously picked up the check.

Next morning I hightailed it down the highway. Bill had mentioned that he had seen some bald eagles on the Pacheco Pass last week and gave me general coordinates to find them.

I stopped at Casa de Fruta first to pick up some dried fruit and my favorite habanero chile flavored pistachios. Snapped a few peacocks in the parking lot.

I was happily cracking and eating the very spicy nuts as I traveled west and espied the lake a few miles up and behold, there was an eagle, just as promised. Third year male, I think. Hot diggity!

I pulled the camera with my long travel lens out of the car and snapped a couple shots, the semi trucks whizzing by me at high speed and putting me in some small fear for my life. By the way, I don't take my heavy, expensive lens on trips like this.

The raptor was pretty far away and it was hard to tell if I was dealing with a bald or a golden eagle.

Didn't really have the camera set up optimally either, the trucks freaking me out a little bit.

Then I did the really stupid thing.

I wiped my eye, not realizing my finger was covered in incredibly potent chili powder. The tears came instantly.

I pulled out the gallon water jug and wet a paper towel that luckily I had in my pocket and dabbed my eye but couldn't really see for a few minutes, stumbling along blindly on the narrow shoulder.

Pain was pretty excruciating. I wouldn't recommend trying it. Take my word for it. The average habanero Scoville heat level is 200,000 units. By comparison, the jalapeno's average Scoville level is 4000 units.

Eagle flew and in my slightly incapacitated state I didn't change the shutter speed fast enough.

It eventually landed on another perch and I grabbed a few shots and well, you get the basic idea.

I always enjoy experiencing these beautiful creatures, that tend to live in gorgeous places and make me feel better about the planet. Will try to do a better job next time out. Maybe bring the fast lens. No more chili covered pistachios!

L'histoire Du Soldat

Igor Stravinski wrote this piece with the Swiss poet C. F. Ramuz in 1918. It is an adaptation of an old Russian folk tale of a soldier who trades his fiddle to the devil in return a book that can "answer every question" and provide unlimited fortune. As usual in such types of deals, with the fortune comes much misery.

The music is scored for a septet of violin, double bass, clarinet, bassoon, cornet (often played on trumpet), trombone, and percussion.

Originally the story was told by three actors: the soldier, the devil, and a narrator, who also takes on the roles of minor characters. A dancer plays the non-speaking role of the princess, and there may also be additional ensemble dancers. 

The conductor Robert Mandell chose to omit the dancers and narrator in this remarkable performance and recording with the Ars Nova Ensemble in 1957. The performers are Stanley Drucker, clarinet; Cyrus Segal, bassoon; David Jandorf, trumpet; James Thompson, trombone; Morris Lang, percussion; Herbert Sorkin, violin; and Reuben Jamitz, double bass. I have had the opportunity to hear the original tape on two of the greatest hi fidelity audio systems I have ever heard, Kip's and Kerry's and it may be the best recording I have ever listened to.

You must not seek to add
To what you have, what you once had;
You have no right to share
What you are with what you were.

No one can have it all,
That is forbidden.
You must learn to choose between.

One happy thing is every happy thing:
Two, is as if they had never been.

Stravinski here, like in some of Wagner's better compositions, creates music beyond time. Pure genius. It might take the world a few hundred more years to catch up. It evokes, amongst other things, the nimbleness and discord of a beebop jazz idiom that would not be created for several decades. 

Wool Growers, Los Banos

It was a long slog up the five today, to my eventual destination in the Central Valley. The wind was incredibly heavy all day, on two occasions near the Tejon Pass it felt like a tire had come off the van the gusts were so strong.

It made for a slow, gritty ride, with two hands on the wheel at all times, had to stay very focused. Seven hours later I checked into my hotel and decided to get some dinner.

I have heard about the Wool Growers restaurant for years but had never stopped by for some reason. Tonight that would change. I took Henry Miller Blvd. about 10 miles southeast, past duck laden marshes and packing houses, definitely a different world up here.

I finally made it to my destination in Los Banos. The Basque restaurant has been in this old building since the 1890's. The Central Valley has always had a large Basque community and they have met in the two story structure for over a century now.

The parking lot was full of duallys and pickup trucks. For once I didn't have the dirtiest car in the lot, but it was certainly close.

You walk past the very spartan bar and enter the dining room, also very plain. Reminded me of some of the rustic tavernas I frequented as a kid when I lived on the Greek island of Ios.

The Basque establishment has very long tables, I counted 26 chairs per table, all covered in red checkered oil cloth.

Hunters, workers, scruffy farmers, guys in NRA caps. Old french posters from the Basque region dotted the walls. I don't think much has changed there in the last 120 years.

Server set me in a seat and here came the food. Farm fare. Bread and butter, beans, potato salad, vegetable soup, green salad.  Huge portions. I could have had a carafe of the house wine too if I wanted it and was still drinking.

The server took my order from a wide variety of protein, pork chops, lamb chops, prime rib, chicken, steak, tri-tip and more. I ordered the roast lamb.

I started digging into the sides and was getting a little nervous. There was just way too much food. I knew the trap and I had to pace myself. I had heard that you need to give yourself an hour or two at these sort of places.

The problem is they served me sides for a table of four or six and I hit them hard. Not gourmet fare, think good peasant food and I mean that in the most favorable way. Not an ounce of pretension at the Wool Growers.

Next came the lamb stew. I flashed to my experience at the French Laundry. Begging them to make it stop... Then came the entree, the roast lamb. I guess I would have ordered something else if I knew that lamb would follow lamb. But both dishes were truly excellent.

Met some interesting people there tonight, very friendly. Family from Encinitas and a man from Fiji. Restaurant staff were excellent.

I skipped the french fries which are reportedly great and the free dessert. Finally know my limits. I went to the new Brazilian barbecue in Carlsbad recently, Texas in Brazil, and hurt myself. Wasn't going to do that again. Will I ever come back here? Sure, but only if I have friends to help me eat.

America

Color me out.

Every day I feel more and more like an anachronism. I think that I am going to do pissy geezer so very well some day, if ever given the chance.

I have been having problems with the key fob for my old Dodge Caravan. It has developed a mind of its own. I have left the front door of my home in the morning only to find the hatch and sliding door of the van wide open. I thought that the fob might need a new battery but that didn't help.

These fobs cost about $250 now, programmed and installed. Ain't cheap being a citizen of the 21st century. I heard that the kid at Joe's Hardware was pretty handy with these things. He took a look and thought he had the ailment fixed but it went crazy again about a week later.

It would open the locks without me even touching it, flash the hazards, all kinds of weird crap. But I have a show in San Francisco this week and can't tolerate a headstrong car that can't be secured.

I broke down and went to the dealership. The diagnosis?  The fob, like its owner, was a touch oversensitive and was officially pow. Moisture, wear, blah, blah, blah. Friday the new key came in. Mexican dude started programming it but I could see he was running into problems. I asked him wussup and he showed me about ten codes on my car that were code red; the emergency brake light I de-wired from the system after the packrat ate the insulation wire for dinner in Santa Fe, the defunct tire sensor that I am not going to pay $600 for, etc.

Didn't I understand that in this brave new integrated world of ours, the key wouldn't work unless all of these items were taken care of? Just what I needed, more shame from my key fob. I cursed under my breath said something in spanish like, no lugar en el mundo por uno hombre pobre. He looked at me with a flash of understanding for a second and said lo mismo para mi, not to worry and somehow buried the dastardly warning codes and got me back on the road. Thank you kind stranger.

*
While I was cooling my jets at the dealership I took a look around and saw that car colors have gotten very monochromatic. Hard to get something these days that is not black, white, pearl, silver, anthracite, metallic, charcoal, graphite, carbon, tungsten or any one of a thousand other shades of gray. Although blue is starting to trend.  Black, white or silver are the most popular car colors in every single category of vehicle, and they have been for some time.

Was reading something last year that said it was almost impossible to find a gold, brown or earthtone colored car these days. Odd, wonder why that is? I know that you can find blue or red but not much else. If I was in a market for a new car the gold tone would make sense, living on a dirt road it would hide a little more dust. But warmth is out. Car buyers want C3PO, not Jabba the Hutt.

I looked up 2019 car colors today and got this.

2019 Car Color Trends  

You’ll notice more hues of blues and grays reflective of technological advances and space exploration. The gray tones mimic the consumer electronics used on a daily basis such as cell phones, laptops, and tablets. The blue tones are thought of to be a resemblance of the blue-light screens we look at every day, and to reflect the growing presence of space exploration. 

Well whoopty freaking doo. Car colors that mimic our stupid video screens and cell phones. Like we don't look at them enough. Gawd. Get me off this dreadful spaceship of fools. Then there was this:

While millennials are the newer target market for carmakers, they still have to consider all markets and provide color options accordingly. If you’re not a fan of the bright colors, don’t fret because white and black are still the most popular car colors with demand at 42%.

You humans are so boring. Predictable and boring, without a lick of creativity, the whole lot of you.

Some of the new car color names are a real hoot. How about gray ambivalence?

BASF predicts its new "Gray Ambivalence" will mesh well with a culture that is taking the lead when it comes to humans interfacing with artificial intelligence, although its name for this metallic gray seems more reflective of a baby boomer's stance on millennials.

You got that right. What's next, pouty blue insouciance? Burnt umber misanthropy? Do you have the full blown sepia psychosis in a four door, Bob? Sorry, I think I missed my stop.

Fog in the redwoods

Gotta get back to you

Sad state

CHP Sgt. Steve Licon - Rest in Peace

A little over a month ago I wrote a blogpost called breakdown that dealt, among other things, with the lack of manners and civility that we are all experiencing in society today. I mentioned that you really see it while out on the road and that more and more people are using the right shoulder to pass other cars.

Just two weeks ago a man hit a concrete pillar passing a big rig on the southbound 15 near Murrieta. Muerte.

The driver of a 2013 Ford Explorer was going 70 to 75 mph in the slow lane as it came up behind the  big rig, a witness told the CHP.  The driver then swung the Explorer onto the right shoulder and sped up to about 80 mph, the CHP report said.

Yesterday there were two more unfortunate fatalities in my area. A CHP motorcycle officer was hit and killed in Lake Elsinore. Driver was drunk. This officer was out there just doing his job, trying to protect us from ourselves, and no way did he deserve to die.

Michale Callahan, 36, of Winchester, was traveling on the right shoulder of the freeway and collided with the CHP motorcycle, according to the CHP. Callahan was arrested for multiple charges, including suspicion of driving under the influence.

And three for three, another accident on 15, this time near Fallbrook, same thing, another car passing a truck on the shoulder. Another life lost needlessly.

NORTH COUNTY —  A 73-year-old motorist died when her car flew off Interstate 15 in Rainbow Saturday afternoon, authorities said.The white Chevrolet Aveo sedan was heading north, weaving in the lanes, when it veered off the right shoulder, witnesses reported to the California Highway Patrol about 3:45 p.m.
At least one person reported that the driver may have been trying to pass a semi-truck by using the right shoulder.
The car overturned down a 25-foot embankment and landed on the shoulder of Old Highway 395, parallel to the freeway, south of Rainbow Glen Road, North County Fire Protection District spokesman John Choi said.

What is going on? Is it inadequate driver's training, bad judgement or just plain stupidity?

I had a car cut right in front of me on Mission this morning, inches to spare. It is almost like the drivers today think they are living in a video game and if they escape contact, it's all cool. But they often don't. You can chalk it up to Darwin, hopefully nature is weeding out the morons but too many innocent people are caught in the wake and losing their lives because of these idiots' irresponsible selfishness. Don't pass on the right shoulder. Be a considerate driver. Don't be an asshole.

High rollers

Claire Hamill - Urge For Going

Terry Reid on guitar. There are so many good versions of this Joni Mitchell song. I suppose the early Tom Rush is my favorite but it was also done by Dave Van Ronk, in fact it was the last song he ever played live. Tony Rice, Crosby, Stills and Nash, George Hamilton and Mary Black also took a turn with it. The little known Claire Hamill does an excellent job here. Sounds a bit like Sandy Denny.

I'm ready for my close up, Mr. DeMille...

Yoshitora

I obtained this early Japanese woodblock print recently.

I thought that it might be the work of Utamaro initially but after a bit of research and an email to Ronin Gallery in New York found out that it was actually created by a man named Utagawa Yoshitora.

Yoshitora was the oldest student of the great Japanese artist Kuniyoshi.

Yoshitora's period of work seems to extend from the 1840's to the 1880's. His birth and death date are not known at this time. He worked in a time period of the late Edo called Ukiyo-e, or "pictures of the floating world."

Uki means both sadness and "to float." The work from this period was popular amongst the middle class of Japan of the time and also affordable to them.

He was prolific, working on both prints and book illustrations, of which he is said to have completed over 100.

Yoshitora screwed up along the way. He was evidently a bit of a rebel. He produced an irreverent print in 1849 called Dōke musha: Miyo no wakamochi "Funny Warriors - Our Ruler's New Year's Rice Cakes." It was accompanied by a rather scandalous poem.

This was interpreted as making fun of the shogunate and various authority figures and the artist was put in shackles for fifty days and summarily expelled from Kuniyoshi's studio. Thankfully, he continued to work after his punishment and expulsion.

I need to find someone to translate the Japanese here. I was told that it was probably produced in the 1860's. I just figured out what was depicted on the print, on my own, thank you. At first I thought the ladies were spinning silk thread. A closer inspection shows me that they are instead probably engaging in the ancient art of dying the indigo blue thread known as Ai-zome, using what is known as Hirose dye. The brazier was the tip-off, not sure why I didn't catch this right away. They are heating up the dye. Unless of course, I am dead wrong in my interpretation, which is always possible as well. I can not find another image of this woodblock so I am on my own here.

I look forward to learning more about this particular print, and the artist.

first postscript: my buddy Dave, who teaches English in Japan, sent me this note -

yes, they are heating the silkworms' chrysalises in hot water to make it easier

to pull the silk and reeling it to make thread so they can then make garments

from the silk.. much like you would put chickens or ducks in hot water to make

it easier to pull their feathers to prepare them for eventually cooking them..

Thanks, Dave. See, I was right and then I was wrong, pays to ask questions sometimes. Would love to get an exact translation of the Japanese if I can.

Let The Sky Fall

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right...

"Dictatorship is dictatorship whether from the right or left." Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (D-N.J.)

I was reading a rather scary article today about Venezuela. According to the article, which is a product of Fox and so not entirely above suspicion, certain far left democrats are agnostic if not outrightly pro Nicolás Maduro, the country's socialist dictator.

These people include Alexandria Ocasia-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Ro Khanna, Rashida Tlaib, Tulsi Gabbard and Bernie Sanders.

As the country’s problems worsen, Democratic Venezuelan-Americans question whether their party’s actions go far enough. A growing number of exiles say they feel forgotten by a new generation of outspoken, progressive Democrats, leaving them less beholden to a party they had long supported.
Issues that for years were hotly debated in an area of Miami known as "Doral-zuela" due to its vibrant Venezuelan community, have made their way to the ears of some of the most powerful lawmakers in Washington, D.C.
The Venezuelans are angry that, as the country continues to spiral, some Democrats keep calling on the U.S. to pull out of Venezuela and lift all sanctions against the government.
“This is where the Democrats have consistently dropped the ball…they have never felt like it was an important issue…it's very difficult to feel and coexist in the same party that is saying these things are so ignorant about my homeland,” said Venezuelan immigrant Helena Poleo.

This new rapprochement from the American left towards Maduro makes me feel very ill. I sympathize with these emigrants. This Venezuelan government and its predecessor have been a disaster for their country and the western hemisphere in every way. Chavez and Maduro have established a beachhead for Iran and international terror in the west. They are now a  bastion of anti-semitism.

They are also regularly using death squads against their own people. Amnesty International accused Maduro of being responsible for at least 8292 extrajudicial executions in his country, a number that is now surely much higher.

Hugo Chavez silenced the opposition and the media, nationalized all the productive industries and declared himself President for life. Maduro has made things even worse. I have written about the disaster that is Venezuela for many years. Unfortunately much of the worst of it was under Obama's watch and enabled by his laissez faire attitude towards the socialist dictatorship.

Bernie Sanders has hired Hugo Chavez's own speechwriter apologist David Sirota, as a Senior Advisor. This is where I get off the bus. The new progressive radical wing of the Democratic party is going to lose this stalwart centrist in very short order if this is the way things are going to be.

Jesus Hits Like the Atom Bomb - Soul Stirrers

Bryce pano

Late night visitor

I dreamed about my late buddy Garry last night. We met at some trails near Del Dios and they magically morphed into narrow slot canyons with enormous cliff faces, somewhat akin to Canyon de Chelle.  We hiked together through this magical wildlands.

The hiking was arduous, there were times the trail was tight and scary and I didn't want to move forward but he coaxed me through my anxiety and I finally surmounted fear and elevation. At one point I was almost stuck in quicksand. Cohen helped me right my ship. He was always like an older brother to me.

We talked a bit afterwards about the ins and outs of the death thing, he admitted to once manifesting from the corporeal realm to the porch of his old ranch as a polar bear. Now that will certainly get the people of Escondido talking.

Not sure what I think about the after life thing. I don't want to believe in it. But I had a strong visitation about six months after I lost my sister. Sometimes the presence in your dream is so strong you just have to believe that you have touched their essence somehow. But such matters are far beyond my mortal ken and pay grade. It was nice to see my dear friend, in any case, if only in sleep.

Unsquare Dance

Roadrunner

Sonny and Brownie

Hillsborough Spring Show

The Blue Heron Gallery will be exhibiting in the Bay Area next weekend. Please come see me at the Hillsborough Antique Show in San Mateo, April 12 - 14, 2019.

I will be bringing an excellent collection of paintings, prints and decorative objects.

The Rolling Stones - Claudine

Tales of tinkly transcendental oceans

First they came for the crown molding...

Yoshitora - Miyamato Musashi fights Sasaki Kojiro at Ganryujima in Kyushu

I was flashing on something the other morning. It will be twenty years next year on our collective journey into the new millennium. Can you believe it? So soon? And what do we have to show for it? Well, we now wear our baseball caps sideways or backwards, that's something. Our political commentators, the Ari Melbers of this world, now pepper their commentary with rap lyrics. Pimple popping videos. That's a great leap forward.

We have become enraptured and informed with the most intimate details of the least accomplished and talented people one could ever imagine, reality television stars. Many people now have new gigs on various social media, large corporations bankroll their precocious cuteness and enthusiasm and call them influencers, in hopes of their getting other muggles to buy their mentor's products.

Our rulers and leaders make proclamations by tweet now. Truth is certainly a casualty in this new epoch of ours, but let's not even go there. We've dulled down and dumbed down and there is no new depth that will not be plumbed in our mad race to the very bottom of the vulgar cesspool.

Brick and mortar is dead, soon practically the only store left will be Amazon. People can now all wear the same clothes and live in the same style of antiseptic boxes. Happily. We are in the great homogenization period. Who wants to be different anyway?

Did read yesterday that the millennials have no interest in the sprawling McMansions of their elders and I think that is a good thing. They are scaling it down, probably scared shitless about issues like the economy and sustainability.

Interesting article on the subject behind a paywall at the Wall Street Journal, Millennials don't want to buy baby boomers' sprawling, multi-bedroom homes, and it's creating a major problem in the real-estate market, which is synopsized here.

"These days, buyers of all ages eschew the large, ornate houses built in those years in favor of smaller, more modern-looking alternatives, and prefer walkable areas to living miles from retail," Taylor wrote.

All well and good.

Younger buyers are also uninterested in outdated interior design.
"Design trends have shifted radically in the past decade," Taylor wrote in The Journal. "That means a home with crown moldings, ornate details and Mediterranean or Tuscan-style architecture can be a hard sell, while properties with clean lines and open floor plans get snapped up."
In addition to their love of open floor plans, millennials are known for being partial to minimalist, low-maintenance designs and sleek, discreet appliances, elements not always found in older homes.

So now we can throw crown molding on the ash heap of history too? That is kind of sad.

Your jail cell is just perfect!

But not surprising. Because anything classic, historic, western, representational, curved, pre -1970 or ethnic is pretty much verboten with the new millennial. Minimalist, decluttered, streamlined, these people are all heading towards the same bauhaus prison motif. They know nothing and they want to know nothing and they don't seem to collect.

Happy to all buy the same knockoff furniture at design within reach and IKEA and lead nearly identical lives in their monastic settings. Hire specialists to headshrink them and then organize up their closets if there's any extra time left. The new enemy is clutter and clutterers, hoarders, pack rats and those misanthropic misfits still stuck in the previous century that are now viewed with the same general disgust and opprobrium once reserved for rapists and murderers.

Who knew that the Jetsons would still be the dominant design imprimatur in our world some sixty years into the future?

I see it heavily in the art market. Amorphous blob art is hot right now, god forbid the artist ever learned how to actually draw or load a brush. Oh, that's right, it's non objective.

Give them an overpriced Keith Haring cartoon with a schvantz in somebody's eye and they are in heaven. Saw a bunch of wannabee Basquiats making my rounds at the shops this morning. So over it, personally.

We have eschewed warm and headed straight to cool and now we are in strictly frigid. I am not saying that the Tuscan wave didn't turn into a monstrosity too, it definitely did.

But do we have to eradicate every last vestige of the old world in the new modern aesthetic? Isn't there a little room for nuance and emotion and mixing in some of the old crap somewhere?

The Boy -1948 - Thomas Hart Benton

I obtained this wonderful Thomas Hart Benton lithograph recently. It depicts a young man, waving goodbye to his family and horse and preparing to make his way in the world. I was proudly showing it to various people entering my shop. Of all ages. And do you know, maybe twenty percent even knew who Benton was? If that. The most famous regionalist in America, or one of the main two if you factor in Grant Wood and nobody knows who either is anymore. I'd give them a hint, Grapes of Wrath, but still no dice. Pollack's teacher. Blank stare. Won't even bring up Titian or Rubens.

It was shocking really. I guess that I expect too much from people. Supply them their gruel and an occasional gluten free iced kombucha latte with green protein and they really don't need much else. Got to pay back those big college loans first, I suppose.

Of course they don't want to learn about the depression because depressions are by their very nature, depressing. Ditto that big war, what was that about again?

We now live in a time of great cultural illiteracy. They don't teach art history in the schools anymore either. And people don't care. Frankly, they don't know shit about art or history. There seems to be a void evident in the old quest for knowledge that drove past generations, the desire to learn about things, to see how they tick, to appreciate their innate beauty.

Every person on the globe has a powerful computer permanently residing on the end of their hand and they still know nothing. Or maybe they actually know something that the rest of us don't know. Why rearrange the deck chairs if the ship is sinking? Who knows?

falling off the ledge - © Robert Sommers 2019

Just how low?

Emily Remler - My Latin Brother

Art Scam

Hello There,

My name is Pamela Mcallister  from Georgia. I actually observed my husband has been viewing your website on my laptop and i guess he likes your piece of work. I'm also impressed and amazed to have seen your various works too,  You are doing a great job. I would like to purchase '' xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 18 x 24 1962-1963 Framed $2400 ''. as a surprise to my husband on our anniversary. Also, let me know if you accept CHECK as mode of Payment.

Thanks and best regards

Pamela

The language was a bit clumsy but I can overlook that sometimes. Hey, she was from Georgia. The woman had written me this email; her husband really liked a modernist painting in my gallery and she would buy it for him for as an anniversary present.

Hush hush.

Later she let me know that she would even throw in a little extra for shipping to grease the wheels.

I responded affirmatively and then the letters started getting a bit stranger and even more convoluted and I started getting suspicious. Asked her at one point if she was legitimate. Something was starting to smell. But she did not want me to ship the painting until the check was cleared so what could be my downside, right?

The painting was $2400. Two days later a USPS priority envelope shows up at the shop with a check for $7400 and change inside. I am wracking my brain, who owes me that kind of money? Can't think of anybody. Return address is a man in Vermont. Must be that woman. Uh oh.

I called the bank the check was drawn on, an Ohio Bank. They would not give me any info on the account or even tell me if it was a legitimate check. I went to my bank and asked to speak to the manager. I explained the deal and she said she wouldn't even deposit it in her bank. It was too weird, smelled too much like a scam. I wondered if this was an overabundance of caution and googled check scams and see that this sort of thing is starting to get epidemic. And it turns out that my particular scam is getting so common it is practically a regular cottage industry. See How to recognize an art scam.

The check seems okay, even to the bank, takes a month or so to crash and burn. The next move, if I had deposited the check, is for them to contact me to refund them the balance. Which would be ultimately coming out of my account when the bank finally got wise.

I have stopped responding to the emails. Today the woman wrote that I was doing something illegal by holding her money and not depositing her check, that I could be prosecuted. Threatened me a bit. Then the mail showed up with another phony check from her for $7400.69.

I contacted the United States Postal Inspection Service and made a wire and mail fraud complaint. Also went to the local sheriff and contacted IC3, the FBI's Internet complaint portal. I have been scammed before. Was not fun. Need to remain vigilant.

Annie Lennox

Chiron, Chyron and Charon

Most people have seen the headline by now - Fox News Chyron Calls El Salvador, Guatemala And Honduras ‘Mexican Countries.’

This geographical mistake has of course sent the entire twitter universe and mainstream media into a paroxysm of tweety delight and Fox, the ostensible state news organization, was quick to order a retraction. Good for them. There is, in fact, only one Mexico. I looked it up, you don't have to double check.

My interest in the story ran deeper, or should I say, shallower? It was the word chyron, which I admit to not being ever familiar with. I knew chiron but not chyron. Chiron was a divine centaur. Could there be an etymological linkage somewhere?

I looked up the word.

Relatively new word, coined in the 1970's, the caption on a television or movie screen.

I am not going to apologize for not knowing the word, we were off of television for over twenty six years, a lot has apparently passed us by. Eponymously named for its manufacturer, the Chyron Corporation.

And what do you know, the seminal company, Systems Resources Corporation, founded in 1966, ultimately changed its name to Chiron, named after the centaur of Greek yore.

Chiron was a pioneer in character generation for broadcast technology, they made the first arrival and departure screens at airports.

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The son of the Titan Kronos and the Oceanid Phylyra, the result of a violent rape, Chiron was deemed the "wisest and justest of all the centaurs." Chiron also differed from the other centaurs in that his front legs were human and not equine. Wasn't actually a centaur at all, with his strange parentage, not that we ever get a choice in such matters.

He was the half brother of Zeus, known as a teacher, a healer and a prophet. Rejected by his mother, his first wound, he was then raised and taught by Apollo. His mother, not able to bear her shame, was transformed into a linden tree. He himself became a master of science and a teacher to many, including Heracles and Jason.

Somewhere along the line the corporation Chiron must have wanted to get away from all that ancient mythology business and re-corporatize the name so they came up with a nifty moniker that meant absolutely nothing, Chyron. Probably a glib fellow from marketing was responsible, who knows?

Chiron and Achilles - John Singer Sargent

Chiron the immortal is also known as the wounded healer. He was accidentally gravely hurt by his friend Hercules, the result of an arrow shot to the knee that caused him immense pain. That particular day Hercules had coated his arrows in the poisonous blood of the monster Hydra. This made the wound especially excruciating. That was certainly a problem as he was immortal and forever is an awful long time to hurt.

After, and you will have to excuse the expression, a little horse trading, he finally swapped places on the rock with Prometheus and was allowed to die and escape eternal torment. Remember Prometheus in chains, getting his liver eaten on a daily basis by the eagle? Ouch!

The wounded healer was often referenced by the psychologist Carl Jung. Jung felt that the analyst was compelled to heal patients because he himself (or she herself) was also wounded.

Subsequent research has borne out the fact that a significant majority of psychotherapists have had early wounding experiences that they say led to their career choices.

Chiron is also the name of a minor planet in the outer solar system, discovered by Charles Kowal in 1977. It orbits between Saturn and Uranus.

Officially known as 2060 Chiron or 95P/Chiron, it was the first-identified member of a new class of objects now known as centaurs—bodies orbiting between the asteroid belt and the Kuiper belt. It is slightly unstable. Like many psychotherapists.

Speaking of centaurs, I have heard the term used to describe transitional furniture and decorative objects that fall between design periods. The urban dictionary has its own modern definitions, among them pejorative terms for unfortunate body types and a vulgar sexual act.

Some reference Chiron as a boatman on the River Styx but that is Charon, an entirely different character altogether.

Charon and Psyche - John Stanhope (1829-1908)

Leslie and the dragonfly