Question

 

How would we spell and pronounce the element lithium today if the discoverer had not had that unfortunate lisp?

Jimi Hendrix & John McLaughlin 1969

Je pisse jonc je suis

 

I took this shot of a public urinal in the French Riviera a couple years ago, not exactly sure of the translation but I think I am close.

I am putting it up because the blog is blowing up today, over 4k visitors the last 24 hours. 

Much of the traffic is from France. What did I say that could blow a little air under their chapeau?

Partir en piste?

Musk and Thiel

When Elon Musk signaled his intentions to buy Twitter, I shuddered. Hard to imagine a man like that with his finger on the informational scales. I have never liked nor trusted the guy. 

It started when he called the guy that went in to save the Thai children in the Tham Luong cave a pedophile with no basis in fact. 

He spread a lot of Covid misinformation. From Wikipedia:

Musk was criticized for his public comments and conduct related to the COVID-19 pandemic. He spread misinformation about the virus, including promoting a widely discredited paper on the benefits of chloroquine and arguing that death statistics were inflated.

In March 2020, Musk stated, "The coronavirus panic is dumb."[In an email to Tesla employees, Musk referred to COVID-19 as a "specific form of the common cold" and predicted that confirmed COVID-19 cases would not exceed 0.1% of the US population.On March 19, 2020, Musk predicted that there would be "probably close to zero new cases in [the US] by end of April". Politico labeled this statement one of "the most audacious, confident and spectacularly incorrect prognostications [of 2020]".Musk also claimed incorrectly that children "are essentially immune" to COVID-19. Musk repeatedly criticized COVID-19 lockdowns. He refused to close the Tesla Fremont factory in March 2020, defying the local shelter-in-place order. In May 2020, he reopened the Tesla factory, defying the local stay-at-home order, and warned workers that they would be unpaid and their pandemic unemployment benefits might be jeopardized if they did not report to work.

In September 2020, Musk stated that he would not get the COVID-19 vaccine for the reason that he was "not at risk for COVID, nor are my kids". In November 2020, Musk contracted COVID-19 and suggested his COVID-19 rapid antigen test results were dubious. However, in December 2021, Musk announced that he and his eligible children received the vaccine.

I don't particularly like the way he treats his employees. Also see Tesla pushing employees to the brink.

During Shanghai’s lockdown, Tesla workers reportedly pulled 12-hours shifts, six days a week, sleeping first in factories and later in makeshift dorm rooms. Tesla factory workers in the US have also been told to work 12-hour, six-day-a-week shifts during production ramp-ups.

Musk counters that he slept in the factory too. What's the big deal? This is Upton Sinclair sort of stuff. The company left hundreds of worker injuries out of its state workplace reports.

Musk has intimated that he may be bi-polar. His behavior seems textbook bipolar. Nothing criminal about that certainly, I feel for him. But having lived with bi-polar family members I feel for those around him. Much of his utterances sound irrational and honestly quite Trumpian. Once ideologically neutral and basically transactional in nature, he suddenly becomes a Republican and wants to buy a media information platform. Oh jeez.

And has announced that he will put the Orange One back on Twitter to spread more of his lies and misinformation. Just what we need.

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Of course, next to Peter Thiel, Musk looks damn good. These guys were once known as part of the PayPal mafia when they worked early on at the start up. Before Musk got the hair plugs.

The Palantir mogul, a gay German American, is backing the most loathsome far right candidates imaginable in America today. 

People like Arizona Senate candidate Blake Masters, who blames gun violence on "black people." He wants to allow states to ban contraceptives. Thiel is also backing people like J.D. Vance and Josh Hawley. 

The author Vance went from a never Trumper to a conspiratorialist spreading lies like Biden was purposefully flooding Ohio with illegal drugs.

Thiel is a very dangerous if not evil man. Musk is just erratic and nuts. God help us survive either or both of them.

Sheneman

 

Dark Side Of The Mushroom

Mass consumption

Leslie just told me that she hears Thai Thai sold. 

Hope the food stays good. Let me know what you think.

Guess we are getting a poke place next door. 

Our town needs a better centralized Chinese restaurant. 

And when is that new Italian joint opening, ever?
 

A Salty Dog

First for everything

This is a year of personal milestones for me. My shop, the Blue Heron Gallery, will have been open (well, sort of open) for twenty five years in September. Put my shingle out on Main Avenue in 1997.

I turn sixty five in November this year and will finally be eligible for medicare. Maybe I will be able to afford to visit a cardiologist again?

My blog is about to hit four million official views. About eighteen more days I suspect. After fourteen years in existence.

And I just had a blogpost removed from Blogger for violating community guidelines. I believe the first time ever, but it honestly might be the second.

I received this notice this morning:

Now, there's a first. I had to think about this a little. What exactly did I write that would cause someone to flag me? I don't put sex, nudity or carnal activities on the blog but will emit an occasional f*ck, which my coffee mates tell me is honestly becoming more and more frequent. Hey, these are frustrating times. I perused the blogger content policy but couldn't figure out what triggered the blue meanies and how I violated the guidelines exactly.

I went online to try to find an archive of the post but failed. 

Only could find this much. But I remember it pretty clearly. Had a picture of Senator Susan Collin's driveway which two ladies had painted with chalk. It was pure satiric political commentary without any vulgar weirdness. Was that enough for me to have a post removed without any benefit of rebuttal? Obviously, yes it was.

Strange times, indeed. Wait, have I been cancelled?

Wild zebra herd, San Simeon

 

Judy Henske

I just read that Henske, one of my very favorite vocalists, died in late April, up in Pasadena. She sang as well as anyone, if not better and with more heart. Woman never got the career break she deserved, but she gave it her all every time she sang. Lived in San Diego for a spell.  Wrote a song mentioning Fallbrook.

I Do The Rock - Tim Curry

White Trash Bed and Breakfast

Strictly from Queens

Pink Flamingos Producer John Waters has put the screws to Donald Trump, pretty accurately in my opinion. The ex President is strictly from Flushing and has all the good taste of Leonard's of Great Neck on a multi event Sunday.

“As soon as Trump was president, it just ended the humor of it. He was the nail in the coffin,” Waters added. “He’s the first person that had accidental bad taste that wasn’t funny.”

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From the gold plated bathrooms to the icky portrait in the hallway, tough to argue with the filmmaker on this one.

I am surprised Trump didn't have the sculptor put apples in the gilded figure's mouths.

It really doesn't get much more vomitous than this, solid gold toilet or no. Is there a name for this sort of patrician bilgewater decor? Or one that can be uttered on a family blog?

And the trashy family and hangers on even makes it more horrid.

A bad 50's  B- movie.

I thought it was pretty funny that the thing that bothers Melania the most about her tenure is that she never got a Vogue cover out of the deal.

It was like a grifting Clampett four year reunion at the Trump White House and the people that visit Branson and Dollywood just couldn't get enough of the show.

And then the rats descended. 

The Magaites that he spawned that followed like he was the Pied Piper to Kristallnacht. The "good people" of Charlottesville.

Galloping Horses A Lazy Mule

Jo Mora - Los Angeles, 1942 poster, early variant

 

Jo Mora was one of the most important artists of early twentieth century California and the American west. 

Even if you do not know his name you have probably seen his artwork somewhere along the line, like on the Byrds cover, Sweetheart of the Rodeo. 

He did many maps and illustrations that reached back into the vaquero history of early California and the Spanish land grants. 

Jo was a talented painter, graphic artist and sculptor. Some of his quixotic and far out sculptures still adorn old buildings in Los Angeles. I took these three shots on a sojourn down Broadway.

Mora was absolutely incredible! He should even have wider acclaim.

Here are a few snippets from the Wikipedia entry for the artist:

Joseph Jacinto Mora (October 22, 1876 – October 10, 1947) was a Uruguayan-born American cowboy, photographer, artist, cartoonist, illustrator, painter, muralist, sculptor, and historian who lived with the Hopi and wrote about his experiences in California. He has been called the "Renaissance Man of the West".

Mora was born on October 22, 1876 in Montevideo, Uruguay. His father was the Catalan sculptor, Domingo Mora, and his mother was Laura Gaillard Mora, an intellectual born in the Bordeaux region of France. His elder brother was F. Luis Mora, who would become an artist and the first Hispanic member of the National Academy of Design. The family entered the United States in 1880 and first settled in New York City, and then Perth Amboy, New Jersey.

Jo Mora studied art at the Art Students League of New York and the Cowles Art School in Boston. He also studied with William Merritt Chase. He worked as a cartoonist for the Boston Evening Traveller, and later, the Boston Herald.

In the spring of 1903, Mora arrived in Solvang, California. He stayed at the Donohue Ranch. He made plans to travel to the Southwest to paint and photograph the Hopi. He spent time at the Mission Santa Inés; those photographs are now maintained by the Smithsonian Institution. Mora visited many Spanish missions in California that summer by horseback. He followed the "Mission Trail", also called the "Kings Highway".

In 1904, Mora visited Yosemite. Later, in 1904, to 1906, Mora lived with the Hopi and Navajo near Oraibi, Arizona. He took photographs, painted and otherwise recorded the daily life of these Native Americans, including the Hopi Snake Dance. He learned the Native languages and made detailed drawings of what he observed.

In 1907, Mora returned to California and married Grace Needham. Their son, Joseph Needham Mora, was born on March 8, 1908. The Moras moved to San Jose, California, where Mora continued his work.

On 22 February 1911, the Native Sons of the Golden West Building, in San Francisco, with six terra cotta panels, by Domingo Mora and his son, Jo Mora, was dedicated. In 1915, he served on the International Jury of Awards at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition and displayed six sculptures.In 1915-16 two of his sculptural commissions were revealed: the bronze memorial tablet with the profile of the late Archbishop Patrick W. Riordan for the Knights of Columbus and the Cervantes Monument in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.By 1919, he was sculpting for the Bohemian Club, including the Bret Harte Memorial plaque, completed in August 1919 and mounted on the outside of the private men's club building in San Francisco.

In 1925, he designed the commemorative half dollar for the California Diamond Jubilee. During this period he also illustrated a number of books, made large murals, and published charts, maps (cartes) and diagrams of the West and Western themes. Beginning in 1937, Mora wrote and illustrated children's books about the West. In 1939, a Works Progress Administration project was completed, with Mora bas-relief sculpture adorning the King City High School Auditorium building.

In 1921 the Mora family moved their primary residence to the largest art colony on the West Coast, Carmel-by-the-Sea. Mora received a commission for the bronze and travertine Cenotaph, for Father Junípero Serra in the Memorial Chapel at the west end of Mission Carmel.He served on the board of directors of the Carmel Art Association, where his sculptures were exhibited between 1927 and 1934. He co-established Carmel's first private art gallery which was operated by resident artists.In 1931 Jo, his wife, and daughter Patricia moved to nearby Pebble Beach into a newly built home. Five years later in the adjoining large studios he completed his massive diorama, Discovery of the San Francisco Bay by Portola, for the California Pavilion at the 1939-40 Golden Gate International Exposition on Treasure Island. At a length of almost 100 feet, with 64 sculptures of Spaniards and Indians and over 200 animals, it was said "to surpass anything of its kind at the Fair." He fashioned smaller dioramas for the Will Rogers Memorial Museum in Claremore, Oklahoma and the Sutter's Fort Museum in Sacramento, California.

The reason I am writing about the artist is that I recently purchased a rare piece of his work with a partner, an early variant of his exceedingly rare and valuable 1942 poster of Los Angeles.

I had the poster lightly conserved and placed it in an old frame that matched perfectly. I had some questions about our piece after comparing it to the other versions I had come across and ended up contacting the Jo Mora Trust In Monterey. You see, there was type missing on this that I saw on other versions. Look at the tree branch top, center. It spells out Los Angeles. What gives?

The archivist there, Peter Hiller, was exceedingly helpful. He explained that the first version was printed on butcher paper. I had a very rare second version of which less than fifty were probably printed and few ever survived. The third version added the Los Angeles type.

The back of my poster, which was originally mounted on poster board had this label affixed advertising two more new Mora maps. 

Because of this, Mr. Hiller surmised that our poster was probably used by Mora for promotional purposes. 

The poster is not perfect, like the rest of us, it is showing the effects of age and discoloration. But even with its liver spots it is a beautiful piece of California history. I have learned some minutia of the Land Grants by examining it that are definitely new to me. If you get a chance, stop by and give it a look.

I would like to sell it privately but I can always put it auction. If you love it, let's make a deal!

Hawk on violet sky

 

Luckovich

 

The Ikettes - I'm blue

New Stuff, Blue Heron Gallery

 

Eucalyptus and bay view, Marin County, 1917 - Percy Gray (1869-1952)

Lots of new goodies, if you would like to take a gander, click here. And my for sale page on AskArt for additional items.

Poor Guy

“If you’re a Republican, you can’t even lie to Congress or lie to an FBI agent or they’re coming after you.” Rep. Louie Gohmert (R - Texas)

Eagle flies on Friday

 

Booker T and the MGs with Boz Scaggs

So what's been happening?

Well, let's see...

Leslie called Tuesday afternoon to tell me that we had a very large oak branch come down and that it was blocking the road. I called my buddy Todd, who is an arborist and paid him to remove the tree from the road. 

Todd showed me the tire tracks that suddenly angled into the tree, the trash truck that had arrived that morning had hit it and the gouges in the wood up high bore that hypotheses out. I am not going to call the trash company because drivers tend to lose their jobs when stuff like this happens so I will eat this one.

Still having problems with new neighbors incessantly barking dogs but they are beautiful dogs and I hope they get comfortable enough to chill one day. Still have not met the neighbor and that is fine with me too.

The other neighbor that drives like a bat out of hell in his red truck and likes to dust the rest of us actually slowed down this morning. He almost hit another resident with his recklessness last week.

I don't really know where all the new people are coming from, Orange County or elsewhere, but when you live on a dangerous dirt rural road, you slow down for your neighbors, you don't speed up. There are blind curves and it might be your number that comes up one day, who knows?

Demographics of the place are definitely changing. I followed three white Lexus SUVs out to the turn on Mission this morning. With the price of real estate going up so high, people are cashing out and some of the new people have no clue about living in a rural setting. Or maybe don't care.

I was at the Firehouse Brew the other day and noticed lots of young people with Let's go Brandon t-shirts and red Maga hats on. Same thing with the stickers on the wall at the Red Eye Saloon. More young right wingers in town. I wondered if these were homegrown patriots or new entrants? Not sure...

Lots more American flags around and thin blue line flags. Great way to measure patriotism. Both are fine but I frankly lost my taste for the latter when I saw how many people beating cops over the heads with flagpoles January 6 were sporting them. Obviously a mere clueless fashion statement with no real underlying meaning. Or maybe those cops don't count?

I had a mess of youngsters from Maie Ellis school walk by my shop the other day and took their picture down at the square. Nice kids.

Red tailed hawks are continuing to get bigger every day and venture farther away from the nest. I never get tired of watching these guys.

I bought a cool stained glass window from a Fallbrook resident who no longer had a use for it. 

Her father was a dentist in town and Buck Gerlach made if for him way back when. Eagle dancer kachina. 

It is not pink, that is the road behind it. 

Here is a picture of Mason holding it up. It is for sale.

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Do you want to help save a rare endangered stallion at a friend's ranch?

Here is the GoFundMe page.

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Bees and fish. 

They are now legally the same thing, at least according to a California Appeals court.

My first response was, can we get any more stupid? But in reading the fine print, I understand the rationale a bit more clearly.

Bees are now legally considered fish in California under the state’s endangered species law, an appeals court in Sacramento ruled Tuesday. The 1970 act explicitly protected “fish,” which were initially defined as invertebrates. And because the act has protected snails and other invertebrates that live on land since, Tuesday’s ruling said it interpreted the legislation to also include bees. “Accordingly, a terrestrial invertebrate, like each of the four bumble bee species, may be listed as an endangered or threatened species under the Act,” the 3rd district California Court of Appeals Associate Justice Ronald Robie wrote.

So they are not calling them fish, they are merely grouping them with the other terrestrial invertebrate. As a terrestrial vertebrate who understands both the importance of preserving all species and the concept of "bellwether species" I applaud this move.

Anytime I drive up the 5 or 99 through the Central Valley and am assaulted with tons of right wing signs decrying the lack of dams and farm water I am tempted to stop with my spray can and write "yeah, fuck the fish" on them. So either or.  In any case, it is hard for me to drum up a lot of sympathy for corporate mega farmers, especially those that are continuously on the wrong side of the environmental debate and who have little or no concern for the rights and well being of farm labor, fishermen and indigenous people.

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I am sort of astounded at the lack of ability to complete tasks this year, specifically my auction. Last year it seemed so easy, this year I am at about 30% of my normal ration. I am pushing but just can't get things done like I used to. Never got covid, must be the sudden onset of old age. Back to the grind tomorrow, have to get this finished.

I saw a statistic the other day that gave me pause to ponder;  That the space between the cessation of World War I in 1918 and 1970 is equal to the time period between 1970 and today, 52 years. Damn, it seems like war took lace so long ago and I still remember 1970 like it was yesterday.

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I was never a huge Star Wars fan but understand that they were a part of popular culture. I thought the acting wooden and horrible, plot predictable, etc. Having said that the later iterations got worse and worse and it became completely unwatchable. 

But then the Mandalorian came about and I was smitten! Wonderful stuff. Then Bobba Fett came out and it started to suck again. Now we have Obi wan Kenobi. Guess what, it is pretty good. Third episode was fantastic. All of the three offshoots are far better than the last franchise movies.

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I have a lot of friends in San Francisco, many less (if any) in Boston. And I hate to incur the wrath but I consider the sports fans in these two cities the worst anywhere for gloating homerism. I never liked any of the teams from either city, in any sport. 

But if I had to pick between Warriors and Celtics I would pick the Celtics to win this year. I like Horford and I dislike Draymond Green. I love Steve Kerr and I know Steph might be best ever shooter, at least since Maravich and the imposition of the three point line anyway, but it just ain't my team. I was a Laker fan until LeBron became the de facto general manager, now it is just a bunch of tired old guys like me. Honestly love Luka, was rooting for the Mavs. Oh well, next year.

Have a good week! 

Republican trauma experts

 

De Adder - Washington Post