Mr. Airplane Man

Editor's Note: I had some ethical qualms about the caption contest that I announced earlier for this photo, so that has been withdrawn and replaced with the original post. Sorry for the confusion.

Before you read any further into this post, stop for a moment and see if you can figure out what is going on in this picture.

My initial guess was that it was photoshopped, but unless Gibson Studio Photo Service in Grove, Oklahoma was way ahead of its time, that's not the case. Next I thought the man was waist-deep in a frozen lake, but the ice would hardly have supported the weight of the plane. And the guy would probably not have such a calm expression on his face if he were in water that cold.

The answer, which you may have guessed by this point, is that the man is an amputee. Bizarre, huh? My neighbor brought this picture over one night while we were all drinking beer on the porch, and after we'd stared at them a while, he gave us the back story.

Apparently his sister had purchased some land in Garnet, Kansas, but in order to claim it they had to dissemble an entire barn and move it off the property within 24 hours, a fine-print clause the seller had already used to scam a few other folks. My neighbor's family, however, succeeded, and in the process discovered a box of documents similar to this one.

Turns out the previous land owner had taught war veterans (either WW2 or Korea, I'm guessing) how to drive again, and in some cases, how to fly small aircraft. My neighbor says he has another picture of the same guy sitting in the cockpit with a dog sitting beside him, but he's not sure exactly where it is right now. I know it's a bit exploitative to display them here, but I couldn't help but share these. Thanks to my neighbor for letting me do so.

Hex appeal

Editor's note: with the onset of October, this site will be indulging in a large number of Halloween-related posts. Earlier today, I had posted a movie review of a short educational film designed to teach high schoolers about the dangers of heroin, but I decided to go with something less macabre to kick off my favorite month of the Gregorian calendar.

This summer, a friend of mine was supposed to attend what she called a "witch camp" somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. Unfortunately, she didn't wind up being able to go. Regardless, the idea of a "witch camp," whatever that is, stuck in my head. If there's a witch camp, than surely there's a fashion camp out there somewhere. I started to wonder what it would be like if a candidate from each camp did an exchange (A witch goes to fashion camp, and vice versa). So far, I have only written an article about the first scenario. However, I would certainly welcome a submission about a beauty queen going to witch camp. I think this drawing works either way.

Witch Goes to Beauty Camp

The first thing the witch did when she got to fashion camp was stick the handle of her broomstick in the beauty fan. When the photographer rushed over to ask what in Hades she thought she was doing, she told him she thought her bangs would look better flat against her forehead.

The photographer, who was already irritated at having to spend valuable time photographing a witch, was about to launch into a tirade when he noticed something peculiar about her. "Oh, my...your black dress is offset perfectly by your green skin," he said, brushing a strand of blue/black hair back from her blemished forehead.

The witch remained nonchalant, remarking simply, "If I must pose, I would prefer to do so au naturel. I want the world to see me, warts and all."

She is known only as Witch, and she is the fashion world's newest sensation. Within days of her arrival at Fashion Camp early last summer, Witch has landed a number of lucrative endorsement deals. Her leap from the pages of Goethe's Faust onto the glossy covers of some of the most high-profile glamour mags in the world has been remarkable, and so far she claims to be enjoying herself.

"A black mass on Walpurgisnacht is not terribly different than the launch party for a designer's new line, aside from the beverages. Personally, I find a lot that is hideous, beautiful, and a lot that is beautiful, hideous. It can be difficult to tell exactly who is posing in the shadows of whom."

The fashion press has seized on the candid crone's remarks, citing her "hex appeal" and crediting her with the invention of "wicked chic." Many glamour specialists say "wicked chic" offers a viable alternative to young women tired of the druggy waif look that has dominated magazines since Kate Moss was a teenager. Also, Witch's arrival on the scene is just in time for fall styles, which rely heavily on cutesy skeletons and other traditional Halloween imagery.

"There's something supernaturally sensuous about the way Witch walks down the catwalk with her black cat beside her," said Cleo Hirschberg, an editor for Fazshion Magazine. "Never in all of my days as a fashion correspondent have I seen such an enchanting combination of awkwardness and aplomb."

Miss Witch herself appears rather nonplussed by all the hoopla surrounding her sudden iconic status. "I'm going to live as long as Methuselah, so it's all very much the same to me. I'll still be zipping around on my broom when Louie Vuitton's great-grandkids are six feet under."

The witch's unnatural beauty and candor have won her a place at the top of the fashion world, but there have also been uncomfortable moments. "At one of the press parties, a bigwig designer proposed a toast to her," reporter Hirchberg recalls. "He asked her what her poison was, and everyone just gasped when she answered 'frog's wine.' They all laughed, though, when Witch explained that Frog's Wine is just an old sailer's term for gin."

Blue Collar Gorillas

This is a glimpse of life at Blue Collar Press, where Jennifer and many other area artist/musicians earn their daily wage. They do neat shirts, posters, and assorted music merch design and distro, and even made me some complimentary buttons to promote this humble little site. As evidenced by this photo stream, they also employ gorillas.

Kinser feature from the UDK, 1/23/03

At Ryan and Kelly's wedding this summer, several of you recalled this article I wrote for the University Daily Kansan about Ryan's unusual feat of drinking an entire 44oz cup of Vanilla Flavor Shot. I didn't have a copy, so this had to be tracked down from the Resource Center at KU's William Allen White School of Journalism, of which I am a proud graduate. I think that many of you will enjoy seeing this article again, for two important reasons:

1) It really happened
2) It's Ryan Kinser

And please don't strain your eyes trying to read it above. Get the large version. Thanks to Mark at the J-School for digging this up, Jenn for photocopying it, our friends for reminding me about it, and Ryan for being Ryan.

Trip to the Wetlands

Clyde Ahote's Haikus from the Wilderness

The Baker Wetlands
on the first Sunday of fall
where tallgrass stands tall

A chorus of kaws
the white noise of the blackbirds
circling the tree

Cattail cotton haze
a girl throws a crabapple
into the green sludge

The sunflowers turn
a faded shade of amber
in late afternoon

Jennifer Brothers
considers a sunflower
with her camera

the young man marches
into the marshes wearing
ecogaloshes

Wetlands boundary
follow the raccoon's footprints
to Wakarusa

What then should we do
when we finally make it
to the outside world?

the click-clack of feet
following the red wood road
there's no place like home



Click here for more of Natalya's photos of wildflowers.

original artworks

This corresponds to an earlier piece on this very site about bidding farewell to an adobe Igloo in a Lawrence, Kansas backyard. The piece ends with the narrator likening himself to a miniature llama/birthday cake decoration that has been moved to a windowsill and given a cidada cowboy as a rider/companion (actually, the hat itself is artistic license). The piece was drawn in summer, but has not yet been publically reproduced until today. Unlike its companion essay, "Goodbye Gloo," the spirit of this piece is believed to be more than pathos. The rendering of a smile on the llama suggests a willingness on part of the artist to move on; to put a happy face on future travels. Upon the piece's unveiling at the Nowhere gallery on 19th and Alaska Streets, one reviewer called it "The song of the open road played by a cicada's kazoo while seated upon the pastel-toned saddle blanket of a miniature llama. Endearingly not-believable."

This piece was made with the usual medley of oil pastels and outdated stamps of a monkey wishing us happy new year.


Most of my drawings could be regarded as "outsider art," in that their expressionistic qualitiy clearly outweighs any real craft. And from time to time, they get made fun of. But validation from the art world is at hand. This drawing was a runner-up in the band Minus Story's "No Rest for Ghosts" art contest. The drawing is part of a 2001 series of oil pastel portraits originally entitled "Rejected Muppets." The series was later incorporated by Jonathan Nagel into his performance at the 2004 Farmer's Ball, to mixed reviews. Someday the series may be displayed here, but only if the curators of fate deem it so, and only if there is an interest on part of the critics and art fans in my reading public (provided such a public exists).

belated 9/11 tribute to a 9/11 tribute

I first discovered the Twin Towers of Rosedale entirely by accident. It was a hot July day in 2004, when I was working for the City of Westwood (which for those who don't know is really just a small neighborhood outside of Kansas City proper).

I had been driving around in a city truck killing time until lunch, and when I got a bit carried away singing along to Janis Joplin on the radio, I swerved a bit and an empty wheelbarrow flew out from the truck bed onto 47th street right by the Apple Market. Fortunately, I loaded the thing back in the truck before traffic was impeded, but I was a bit embarassed and decided to make myself scarce for a while.

Once that adrenaline wore off and I drifted back into my usual sleep-deprived psychosis, I drove north into the more unkempt neighborhood of Rosedale, a place no Westwood employee is supposed to visit while on the clock, if ever. I drove a few blocks into the god-fearing, barbecue-loving neighborhood where I lived until I was four, but which I still don't have mapped out too well. I turned a few times and then a few more and all of a sudden there it was: a 10-foot-tall replica of the World Trade Center, planted in a flower bed in someone's front lawn.

I couldn't believe my eyes. I marveled at it for a minute, noticing the somewhat crudely-made plaque at the bottom that listed the events of 9/11 in brief along with the total number of people killed. "Never Forget," it read at the top.

I returned to the maintenence shack a bit bewildered, and when I told my co-workers about the discovery they seemed amused but skeptical. I wondered if they believed me, as I was honestly not sure I'd really seen those towers myself.

When I did try to drive back and find the towers later that week, I didn't see them anywhere. Maybe they really had been an illusion, a hallucinatory result of not sleeping more than a few hours each night. I had almost given up my search when, at the corner of 44th and Fisher, I saw them. The Twin Towers of Rosedale were real after all.

I drove back by a bunch of times that year, always to point out the monument to friends. We all thought the towers were pretty funny, but I think we all silently wondered about the artist's motivation. Even if he were just a kook who got a bit carried away with patriotism and yard art, 9/11 must have affected him rather deeply to inspire such a large, unconvential tribute. I may have laughed at the man's monument, but I did respect where it was coming from.

I was also kind of afraid of the whole thing, which is why the photo Jennifer took of David and I is so blurry. We didn't want to hang around and scare the owner into thinking Bin Laden and his V.I.L.E. henchmen were trespassing on his property, so we didn't have time to take a proper flash photo. Sure enough, the last thing I heard about that block of Fisher Street was that a dead body had been found in someone's back yard. Probably unrelated, but you never know.

Today, the KC twin towers are a thing of memory, just like the real-life buildings that they were modeled after. Gone, but not forgotten. Rosedale -- like much of working-class America -- will not forget.

Will Oldham comes to Lawrence

Will plays some songs


Will turns into a cat


the hipsters are baffled by the transformation

The above photos are from Will Oldham's free in-store at the Love Garden in Lawrence. They painted a nice little backdrop for him and I was fortunate enough to have a place near the front. A lot of people crammed in to see him play, but everyone was silent as could be during the set, aside from one guy who passed out cold and fell down back by the recent arrivals section. Also entertaining was the way one of the Love Garden house cats crawled up on stage and stared at Mr. Oldham while he played, which he seamlessly incorporated into the lyrics of his songs.

The highlight for me was when he took requests. I called (but not too loudly) for "Blockbuster," meaning his song from the "Hope" EP, "Werther's Last Blues to Blockbuster." A few people yelled out other stuff, but Will just started strumming for a minute and stared off in concentration, as if trying to remember the chords. Everyone quieted down again, and sure enough, he played the number I asked for. I was very excited, and grabbed Jennifer's ankle from where I was sitting Indian-style on the floor. There were quite a few times I had stayed up all night in Germany playing guitar with Wade, either at our places or on the Rhine, and that song never got skipped. Pretty neat to hear the man himself play it by special request.

Haikus and photos, 8/25 - 9/3

Some Haikus and pics to chronicle the last two weeks or so. All the photos in Missouri (the bulk of the lot) taken by Jennifer; Kansas snapshots snapped by me. Missouri locations include old Frau Meierhoff's stained glass factory and loft in the City Market, and various Joplin landmarks like Arde's Villa, a restaurant which was built on the site of a deserted public swimming pool. The links will lead you to albums from Jennifer's flickr site. Worth checking out.

Kansan locales include Maggie's Farm in North Lawrence, Kansas State University, and a scenic overlook of the Kanzaa Prairie just outside Manhattan.


warehouse of treasures
the golden areolas
of the statuettes


highway underpass
where cyclists fear to pedal
playground of the trolls


3,000 years late
for my meeting with mneme
muse of memory


hedges and lilies
of redding's mill missouri
petrified cherubs


fake classic frescoes
where children once went swimming
a lifeless blue hose


hamburger hi-way
the road to obesity
is paved with milkshakes


the capri motel
sleep off decades' worth of kitsch
with our special rates


oh goodness greenness
behold the kanzaa prairie
you lone sunflower


BWB
traveler from New Jersey
surveys his old state


Professor Wetzel
reports the latest findings
from the microscope


a window closes
on the giant shuttlecock
just a reflection


I played the mouth harp
in the order of kaos
organic space jams


magic birthing hut
amadeus was born here
on saturday night


the science of bugs
is not to be confused with
the study of words


gondola travels
under the venetian bridge
ripples of stained glass


the devil's blue dress
is hung up in the closet
bye bye, debutante


take a final hit
from the dark bowl of perry
embers of summer

Python Personality

In the process of clearing out the family basement, my mom found this profile I made as a second grader at Westwood View Elementary School (mascot: Pythons). For any of you who may have clicked onto this page without knowing who I am, or any of you who know me but maybe never realized what ambitious travel plans I once had, this page should clear things up a bit. For a larger version, click here.

frauen, die schreiben...

My friend Ayla maintains a lovely and frequently updated Web log about life in Hamburg and wherever else she travels. The other day, it was on the top 20 list of Wordpress's best blogs of the day. I'm not sure what that means, but it's certainly well-deserved. As a tribute, I'd like to hit you all with this verse encouragement to check out her site, .11freundeundich.

A light in Ayla's Attic, September 2006

What does Ayla keep in her attic?
What thoughts will achieve such loftiness?
What memos will she send forth
from her personal blog-acropolis?

A poem, a slideshow, an artfully cropped photo
Points of interest on an idea's journey
from germ to sublimation
word-experimentations
undertaken by this fate-bound band of first-generation bloggers

The German tagline translates to:
"women who write are dangerous"
But I don't feel threatened
Only inspired to keep describing
the whos whats hows and whens
without stopping too long to question why

the sorrows of the soda-pop expatriate

These are difficult days for the Soda-pop Expatriate. After many years abroad, he has returned to America with a diminished view of the way his favorite beverage is perceived around the world. The Yankee-friendly exuberance of the 1950s has finally fizzled out, and Coca-Cola is no longer politically popular. In fact, it has served as a scapegoat for many greater health and societal ills around the world. Obese New Delhians credit cola with their ungainly gains in girth. Rural Guatemalans blame the products for a spike in Diabetes cases. Many European universities have launched a boycott on Coke products on their campuses, determined to throw off the yoke of what they refer to as "carbonated imperialism."

At home as well, there are soda woes aplenty. Mr. Pibb has been stripped of his manhood, and is now referred to as Pibb Xtra (it's the extra that gets him every time). Mello Yello, the tired hippie, is not so much mellow as she is jaundiced. Elementary schools are considering removing pop machines from cafeterias in favor of less-fattening options. Across the country, thousands of health fanatics underdose on Cola every day.

Finally, the Soda-pop Expatriate's personal life is not what it used to be. Rather than spend his afternoons cruising down small highways at 120 km-per-hour with the windows open and a 44oz fountain drink in his hand, he instead drinks several paper cups of third-rate coffee each morning within the air-conditioned sterility of an office tower. Thanks to recent weight gains, holes in his teeth and several unsightly stains on his Siberian bearskin rug, even the Soda-Pop Expatriate is doing his best to kick the habit.

But it isn't easy. In the same way recovering addict musicians quit playing certain kinds of music because they associate it with drugs, the repatriated Soda-pop Expatriate is not quite sure what other concessions will need to be made in order to make a clean break. Naturally, some compromises are in order. So far, he has decided only to drink Coke on lunar holidays, on trips to the beach and whenever he goes out to eat Mexican food. And at lunch. Still, many emotional and physiological attachments to high-fructose corn syrup-flavored carbonated beverages remain.

Recently, he wrote this speech on the occasion of his one-night anniversary of not drinking any soda. It is addressed to the Soda Goddess, and is included exclusively here for your reading enjoyment.


Goodbye, Cola
by the Soda-pop Expatriate

Oh, opaque liquid

Your syrupy presence in my stomach
was always a comforting discomfort

Years ago, I went on Paul Revere's midnight bike ride for cola

searching for
the blinking beacon
of vending machines
stacked on top of each another

1 if by land
2 if by sea
3 if by air
4 if by dream

Now I will try to live without your carbonation
And I must admit, I feel lighter now
without your bubbles in my system

Lighter, but somehow less tied
to this gas-station covered landscape

where the endless soda
fountains of youth
spill over and
over and over

mythical biketrip to dubrovnik

LHW060822

All I never needed to know I learned from...

It's Never o'clock in Kansas City, and somewhere Midtown's most enigmatic graffiti artist is leaving his mark on the neighborhood.

His name is Neverino, and no one knows where he comes from. I first saw the name "Neverino" painted on a square of sidewalk near my apartment, and I found it funny enough to invent a backstory. Neverino, I surmised, was a little boy of either Hispanic or Italian descent who was struck and killed by the "Little Bastard" (the same Porsche 550 Spyder James Dean was driving when he died) at the bus stop on 43rd & Main. Now the listless spirit of the boy roams on, unable to communicate with the waking world except through spraypaint and paintmarkers.

I liked this story so much that I began to believe it, even inventing a cutesy, Spanish-sounding voice for Neverino that I often used while talking on the telephone. Soon, however, I began to realize that Neverino was a bigger phenomenon than I had imagined. I started to see variations on the Neverino name on signs and buildings around the neighborhood. A giant "Never" appeared on the back of a Broadway st. billboard. One Sunday, I even noticed that my mailbox had been tagged by a certain "Mr. Neverino." Almost overnight, Never was everywhere.

It was almost scary, the way Never always seemed to be just a few steps behind or ahead of my own urban adventures. In a parking lot down the street from the prostitute-frequented QuikTrip on Troost, I discovered a pair of Toys'R'Us truck trailers, only to see that Neverino had left his mark. Just two days after I took a photo-snapping tour of the Mission Mall ruins, I drove by to see that Never and his associates had written their names on the eastern face of the building. This act in particular demonstrated a boldness that astounded even me. Not only had he canvassed Kansas City, Missouri -- the long arm of Neverino could also reach into Kansas.

I thought and thought about a time that our paths might have crossed, but couldn't seem to come up with one. If I had seen Neverino, I hadn't known it. Still, I can't help but feel like I've gotten to know him at least a little bit through his artwork. A few of the things I've learned about Never:

• He has a playful sense of humor. Next to the giraffe on the aforementioned truck trailer, he wrote: "Neverino: I'm a Toys'R'Us kid."

• He is a night owl. On a giant, bubbly series of purple-and-green tags on the back of the Berbiglia liquor store, he wrote "It's 4 in the morning and it feels like spring."

• He is well-versed in history. Another tag near the liquor store reads "the home of the Nevercaneezer," a reference to Nebuchadnezzar, the ruler of Babylon who built the hanging gardens in 600 B.C. as an ersatz tropical paradise for his homesick wife, Amyitis.

• He is physically daring. Even a phantom would have difficulty scaling the heights Never must reach to complete his tags.

Because these observations shed little light on Neverino's personal life, it may be more worthwhile to take a look at the linguistic impact Neverino's marker has made on the community. Under Neverino's semantic makeover of Midtown, The Kansas City Star becomes The Never, and the Pitch changes from a weekly to a (you guessed it) never. 43rd & Bell becomes 43rd & Never. A nearby sign reads "Do Not Never Enter" and a simple red stop sign becomes a bright octagon of motivation. Local business hours either never end or never begin.

A first-time visitor to this ethnically diverse region of Kansas City might easily look around and declare himself in never-never land. Not surprisingly, the local police force is not amused. One afternoon, while snapping one of the very photographs displayed here, I noticed that I was being observed by a member of the KCPD. Though he eyed me dubiously, I think even he could tell that I was but a documentarian; a humble custodian of Never's legend and not its elusive author.

Just when I was reverting back to my original beliefs that Neverino was a specter invisible to the human eye, I heard a report on my police scanner that two officers had cornered a young male with a spraypaint can at the side of the Seville Best Western, just a block away. I dropped my harmonica and hard lemonade and raced to the scene as fast as my legs could carry me. From behind a dumpster I saw the officers closing in on the shadowy figure (Neverino, I presumed). The officers brandished their nightsticks, and one of them shouted, "Everything will be a lot easier if you just drop that spraypaint!" With a sudden hiss, a great purple cloud engulfed the three of them, causing the officers to lose sight of their suspect and start coughing. When they finally succeeded in waving the cloud away, the culprit had vanished, leaving his one-word response on the wall:


I know it may be a bit hard to believe, and believe me, I wish I was joking. I thought the superstitious phase of my life was over, that my days of peddling ghost stories had ended with my last weeks at summer camp. But I'm afraid Neverino has extended my belief in these matters indefinitely. Should I ever be in danger of losing my faith in the spraypaint-supernatural, I'm sure a fresh tag from Never will be there to make sure I never do.

Arthur Lee, 1945-2006

As a tribute to the recently departed frontman of the sixties band Love, I'm going to include my own short review of the Arthur Lee concert I attended at the CMJ music festival in October 2003, when I represented KJHK Lawrence as the jazz director. The piece is part of a greater CMJ journal I kept for "No Radio" issue 2, which never really saw print. Might as well share it now.

A grainy photo of Arthur Lee (on the far left) shourded in mystery.

Love with Arthur Lee, live at the Warsaw Ballroom 8/23/03

"...If nothing else, the steep price of suds in Brooklyn kept me sober enough to find my way to the Warsaw Ballroom for the Love with Arthur Lee show that night. For those of you who weren't somewhere between Clark & Hilldale circa 1966, Love was the Los Angeles psychedelic outfit who were imitated in sound by the Doors and in style by Hendrix. In fact, if you listen to the claims of Lee, the self-professed "first black hippie," Love was imitated in everything by just about everybody. If you listen to his music, however, Lee's claims begin to sound plausible.

The extravagant, out-of-the-way Warsaw Ballroom made an apt setting for the event. Elaborate murals flanked the stages, and Zwyiec beer was sold in several locations. I saw more gay couples and older fans than college radio-heads, and as snobby as it sounds, it was nice to be around a crowd of people who knew Love's music from something other than the Inez/Luke Wilson motel love scene in "Bottle Rocket." Though Love's contributions are widely recognized today, the pre-concert atmosphere still held the thrill of an underground sensation.

After much adjusting of microphones and music stands, Lee and band began with "Your Mind and We Belong Together," the swaggering outtake from Love's 1967 masterpiece, "Forever Changes." Right away, the band's arsenal of trumpets, flute and a string quartet were unleashed to the fullest effect. Lee sported a colorful bandana under a black hat, only removing his sunglasses for 15 seconds of the whole performance. Lee remained animated the whole time, smiling, playing guitar and harmonica and even breaking into a jig later in the set. There were moments I could have sworn he was barely out of his twenties.

The set also featured a good representation of songs by Bryan MacLean, the late guitarist whose flamenco-inspired style gave Love much of its baroque sound. MacLean's "Orange Skies" is the day-dreamiest number on any Love album, and his composition "Alone Again/Or" (you know, the one with the lyrics "I think that people are the greatest fun") has all but become Love's signature song. The rest of the set ranged from Burt Bacharach's "Little Red Book," to "Rainbow in the Storm," a new song which Lee also announced would be the title of an upcoming autobiography.

Though it took him a few songs to warm up, Lee sang forcefully and convincingly, giving his lyrics a light-hearted lilt at some times and an ominous emphasis at others. Lee's lyrics have always sounded more prophetic than political, and seemed eerily relevant throughout the show. When this version of Love (which features no original members other than Lee) played "The Red Telephone" -- a reference to the president's direct office line -- the band stirred the song into a frenzy while Lee screamed, "I want my freedom!" Lee has a special claim to this phrase, having served seven years for weapons charges before a judge overturned his stentence in 2001.

Listening to something haunting from the past is one thing, but seeing it come alive this convincingly was stirring, to say the least. By the time Lee asked the crowd "Why does this feel like a historical event?" it sounded like a rhetorical question. "What's cooler than being cool?" asks the recent hit single by Outkast. Even in 2003, the answer was still Arthur Lee..."

Update: While checking a song title on All Music Guide just now, I saw their multi-authored write-up about Love's music. Worth reading, even though there's still no substitute for hearing it yourself.

The storm has passed, the rainbow remains.