Flipbook

In lieu of any lengthy written pieces this week, I thought I'd doll things up a bit with a collection of photos and scanned postcards that I found on my flash drive today. Today's tour will take us into the realms of fine art, history, haunted Lawrence, and former Hanseatic League strongholds.

First, a couple pieces of art.

This is a collage of Liz Gardner's "pocket-sized pieces" from 2007 and 2008. I arranged this page for photo printing and then cut out each individual square for the little book of haiku and art we made for one of her exhibits. All in all we sold -2 copies. That's right, negative two (nobody bought any, but a pair did get swiped). I suppose that could be viewed as discouraging, but at least we can't do any worse in our next publishing ventures.


One of Jennifer's stipple pieces, modeled after a print we found in an old Czech cinema magazine, I think.


The Barco Rammer -- it does what you want it to do.


Another postcard scan. This is the Alte Elbtonnel in Hamburg. I don't remember it having such colorful lights, but it definitely is eerie any time of day.


A photo I took a few years ago. The tunnel in the previous picture originates underneath this harbor market area.


Hamburg, in the olden days.


Can anyone tell me who this is? Hint: he's one of Lawrence, Kansas' best-known mystics.


The ruins of Stull Church, just before they tore them down


This 1950s depot is going to be torn down so that it can be more accessible for the handicapped. I never see anyone inside when I walk by at night, except for a guy with a long beard and an empty bottle sleeping on a bench with a pile of newspapers for a pillow. I think he missed his train a few decades ago and hasn't bothered waking up to catch any of the others.


Another midwestern depot, this time in Galesburg, IL. I'll be going here for youngest brother's graduation in a month.


Today's closing shot is of the Bowersox mill in Lawrence during stormy conditions. I think it's a good one to close on.

Hope you enjoyed today's photo tour. More from me in a few days.

City of Fountains

Just saw that the fountains in Kansas City will be turned on after all. (Ironically I saw this link via Tony, who had called for them to be shut down and paved over)

Anyway, it's good news as far as I'm concerned. Although I do think the city could be smart and save a bit of money by not running them through January, which is when we took this picture below...

Now that the city has stepped up and the fountain issue has been taken care of, Kansas City can retain its title as the City of Fountains, taking us one step closer to the hedonism and revelry the town enjoyed in its glory days.

(Image credits: Top photo of Swope Park by Jenn, middle photo of Historic Northeast fountain by Lukas, illustration of KC's glory days provided by Lucas Cranach the Elder)

A Dog's Life

Last week I posted a picture of a pow-wow for the hearing impaired that took place in Olathe way back in the day. Blogger Dave (curator of the mouth-watering www.kclunchspots.com) was kind enough to point me toward a few other scintillating snapshots from Johnson County's colorful past, which he took part in cataloguing and uploading to JoCohistory.org as part of his job. Thanks to Dave for this, and credit for these photos goes to JocoHistory.org. The magic in these photos, however, belongs to us all. Here's a few highlights to start out with:

Fairway mayor's wife in multicolored housecoat with dog

Women shooting pool outside in the yard

Man with Overland Park pennant (a personal favorite)

Raw meat, wine, and a giant cleaver

The all-time greatest series, however, has to be that of Buddy the Deaf Dog.


His name is listed as Buddy the Deaf Dog, though "Debonaire" might be a more fitting description.


Buddy tickles the ivories at this School for the Deaf event, playing a boogie-woogie for the enjoyment of the ladies. Much like Beethoven, a hearing disability was not about to stop Buddy from symphonic composition or impromptu jam-sessions.


He also fought fires.


Smoked cigarettes...


...and cigars (pictured here with owner Bob Parker)


Buddy was also quite the scribe, penning upwards of 20 personal letters and post-cards per day to his many friends and confidantes on Broadway, in Hollywood or back in the pound. Buddy employed an unusual sideways method of penmanship that nonetheless produced a technically marvelous cursive.

Unfortunately little or none of his writing has survived to the current century, even in the annals of JocoHistory.org. However, a search did turn up a joint holiday postcard mailed out by Buddy and his master, Mr. Parker.


With that presentation, Buddy, Bob and I would like to wish you a happy, snappy afternoon. To wish you anything less would be, well...something of a boner.

See you dogs later.

Red vs. Best Picture

R: So I went to see this absolutely awful film tonight with my wife. I'm almost embarrassed to admit that I even saw it.

L: What was it?

R: It's called Slumdog Millionaire

L: The same Slumdog Millionaire that won Best Picture?

R: Yes. It is quite possibly the worst film that I have ever seen.

L: I knew you wouldn't like that movie. You automatically hate every rags-to-riches movie set in a foreign country and done by a Western director.

R: I hated that favela movie, too.

L: City of God? I know. You told me many times. But go ahead, I want to hear why you didn't like Slumdog.

R: The entire plot is this kid from the slums of Mumbai goes on a game show and knows the answer to every question because he spent his entire life chasing after some whore.

L: What's wrong with that?

R: That's terrible! Imagine if it was the exact same plot, only it took place in suburban Boston with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney. You would hate it.

L: Okay, but what if Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney were in it, but it still took place in the slums of Mumbai?

R: (contemplates) So the film would be the exact same, except Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney would be acting out the lead roles, even during the childhood sequences, entirely without explanation...

R&L (in unison, more or less): Now that's a movie I would pay to see.

Our beautiful region

Just for fun/filler, here's a few archived photos of how heartwarming life can be here in the heartland.

This is from an archive of severe weather photos published online in the Star last week. I'm posting this mostly as a personal reminder to take shelter when the sirens go off instead of climbing out on the roof to try and spot the funnel clouds. T'ain't worth it.


Speaking of funnels, there's no where in town (that I'm aware of) with better funnel cakes than World O' Fun, which is currently for sale, by the way. This picture, also from an archived KC Star set, is a shot of the amusement park back when it had character. Although perhaps a little bit too much character in this viking's case. I'm not sure what he's got up his tunic sleeve, but that feigned innocent smile and phallic intimation in his height warning make me a little uncomfortable for that gal with the braids.


My friend Toby dug this up off jocohistory.net. This looks like the kind of photo someone might find in their grandparent's attic, causing them to question what kinds of bizarre rituals actually took place in JoCo in generations past. Plenty of more interesting shots where that came from.

If you've got any other bizarre images from the region or caption suggestions for any of these shots, feel free to send them my way and I'll post them here. It don't pay nothin' but it sure does look good on a resume.

Searching...

I have a bad habit of leaving piles of poetry all over the apartment, reams and reams of papers torn out from the typewriter only to be trod upon or carried out the window by the spring breeze, where they often alight on non-poetic things like fence posts and car windshields.

Recently one of these sheets of verse wound up in the hands of the apartment caretaker, a slight but strong-hearted Tunisian woman who knocked on my door once she picked up the paper and recognized my signature typeface. "Young sir, I knew that you had troubles, but nothing like this," she said, holding the paper toward me with a look of concern and sorrow.

Upon recognizing the particular piece she held in her hand, I smiled and shook my head. I had, in fact, carefully selected, arranged and typed out the following verses. But as you're sure to see, this was no ordinary poem...

"?"

Who do you think you are
Who do i vote for
Who do i look like
Who do you love
Who does she think she is
Who done it
Who do you want to be

What could be better
What could happen to the target cells in an animal that lack receptors for local regulators
What could cause dizziness
What could happen in 2012
What could cause a missed period
What could cause a false positive pregnancy test
What could he be thinking
What could cause blood in stool
What could you buy with 700 billion

When will i die
When will the world end
When will i get married
When will we know who is president
When will i see you again
When will i be loved
When will twilight be on dvd

Where the wild things are
Where the hell is matt
Where the red fern grows
Where the heart is
Where the sidewalk ends
Where the buffalo roam
Where the light is
Where the truth lies
Where the streets have no name

Why do cats purr
Why do men have nipples
Why do dogs eat grass
Why do leaves change color
Why do men cheat
Why do we dream
Why do we yawn
Why do people smoke
Why do dogs eat poop
Why do fools fall in love

How to tie a tie
How to kiss
How to get pregnant
How to make money
How to lose weight
How to draw
How to make a website
How to cook a turkey
How to write a resume
How to lose friends and alienate people

Where is the love lyrics
Where is dubai
Where is chuck norris
Where is my mind
Where is the g spot
Where is waldo
Where is my polling place
Where is my stimulus check
Where is the love

- LW/Google, 2009

As you might have already guessed, the lines above are not the product of my teeming brain, but rather the questions and concerns of millions of people as typed into a Google search window. All I did was type in the first two words and wait until those questions popped up as part of the "auto-complete" or "auto-fill" function, which attempts to finish your question based on what countless people have already run searches for. What you see above is almost exactly what came up in the search fields when I compiled this last month, though I'm sure it would be slightly different now.

So the questions in this piece are not those of one man, but rather all men -- although the results are admittedly skewed toward English speakers with Internet access and a marked neurosis about pregnancy issues.

I'm being a bit tongue-in-cheek about this, as usual, but I actually really do like this formula for generating short works of literary ephemera. I think it would be really fun to come up with a short video or animation where a different voice reads each line. It's like interviewing someone, except you're getting to their most secret concerns without even knowing who they are.

If nothing else, I hope the chorus of questions above serves as an antidote to the loneliness and secrecy that so often accompany an individual person's google search. As my dear friend Scott Frances said in response to this piece:

Thanks for your inspirational message. I really related to this poem, especially the following parts:
How to kiss
How to get pregnant
Where is the g spot

When I read your explanation, I was so happy to know that other people were also googling the above lines. It made me feel like I'm not alone in this world.

And that, my friends, is all a blogger/poet/search engine can really hope to achieve.

An Italian in Detroit

This is a joke that my grandfather faxed to us quite a few years ago. It's best if you read (or even shout) it out loud. Especially the last line.

German lesson #17

I haven't posted anything in or about the German language lately. Unfortunately I haven't done much speaking, reading or writing in German at all recently until I helped translate the packaging on the Micro Korg vocoder that Nathan bought last week (fun new vocab word: Schwanenhalsmicrofon. Literally "swan-neck microphone"). This got me inspired to go back to my multi-volume set of Goethe, which I plan to quote from extensively on this site over the next few months.

In the meantime, something more modern and succinct...

A few years ago, my friend Till was sitting next to a mysterious looking guy on the S-bahn in Berlin. From what I remember him telling me, the guy was of Asian descent, had long hair drawn into a pony tail, and was totally focused on writing a text message on his phone for several stops. Eventually the guy looked up, handed Till the phone and asked if he would proofread the message for him.

As it turns out, the guy's German was impeccable. The message, however, was a bit unorthodox. It read:

Vielen Dank für deine Hilfe. Ich habe die Medikamente bekommen. Ich habe bei einer Schlägerei und Schiesserei noch zweimal meine Nase gebrochen!

Which means, in English:

Many thanks for your help. I have received the medications. I have broken my nose two more times during a beat-down and a shootout!

The interesting words here -- and the subjects of today's German lesson -- are "Schlägerei" and "Schiesserei." Schlägerei comes from the verb "schlagen" (to strike) and the suffix "erei," which generally has a negative connotation, is an allomorph meaning something like "around" in this case. So literally it's something like "punch-around," which to me conjures up a pretty funny image, much like the one above taken from a Spiegel.de article about a post-soccer game brawl. "Schiesserei" is the same thing, only with guns (schiessen = shoot).

So with these new vocabulary words under your belt, and this dubious explanation of their meaning, you're all set for your big trip to German-speaking lands. Thanks to Till and the mysterious Asian-German warrior for providing the context for today's lesson.

Six years and counting

Once you've got Baghdad, it's not clear what you do with it. It's not clear what kind of government you put in place. How much credibility is that government going to have if it's set up by the U.S. military?

Once you got to Iraq and took it over, and took down Saddam Hussein's government, then what are you going to put in its place? If you take down the central government of Iraq you can easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off. It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq.


Iraq War anniversary quiz time: Can anyone tell me who made these statements and when?

Snapshot of the Week

Taken last week in downtown Williamsburg, Kansas. Once I have more info on where junk can be donated to build this playground, I'll be sure to share.

Jenn took this photo. If you didn't see the sequence of our tour of the dark inside of the arch, you can see that here.

City of ?????????

How many times have you driven by one of the city fountains in the summer months and smiled at the sight of a bunch of kids playing in or around them?

That might be a sight of the past if the city continues with its latest plan to save money.

If you haven't heard, the Kansas City Parks Board does not plan to turn on any of the city's 48 fountains this year. At all. I don't know exactly why this bothers me so much. Maybe it's because I'm a water sign. Or because the image of children frolicking in empty fountain beds instead of streams of water is a mite depressing. Or perhaps it's because Kansas City bills itself as the CITY OF FOUNTAINS.

I know the budget is tight and you don't want to cut important things like police or trash pickup. But surely it can pony up the $160,000 necessary to keep the fountains running for at least a few months of the year.

Sure, keeping the fountains off in 2009 might seem like a good way to ride out the current economic crisis. But if you don't turn them on this year, it will be even more difficult to do so in the future. The repair bill for fixing fountains that have been left dry for lengthy periods of time would likely be much higher than 160K. What seems like a harmless and necessary cutback now could be a death sentence for many of these fountains in the long run. Which is pathetic, considering this is the so-called "city of fountains." (Or did I mention that already?)

I've heard some people say that this is a great opportunity for private citizens or businesses with deep pockets to step in and save the day. But what then? Will they be relied on to keep the fountains going indefinitely? And how long before we'd start to see things like "Sprint/Nextel Women's Friendship Fountain!" in glitzy signs above the fountains themselves?

Going without fountains for one year is certainly not the most tragic thing in the world. After all, there are plenty of countries where people can't even find or afford clean drinking water, much less decorative displays of the stuff. But while we're spending millions of dollars funding stadium renovations and exclusive entertainment districts, why not make enough of that money available to keep alive something that people of all ages, races and social classes can enjoy?

Kansas City was founded and designed by people who had a vision of how to turn an uninspiring trading settlement into a viable, attractive community. If they hadn't, who knows what this place would look like. Operating fountains is a small civic amenity, but a significant one when it comes to the allure and vitality of this place. And for those whose parents can't afford to get them a country club membership, they're one of the only places around to cool off on a hot summer day.

I'd encourage people to voice their displeasure with this plan, and I'd encourage the city to find some way around this particular cut in the budget. Because fountains are fun for everyone. And "City Too Cheap/Broke To Turn On Its Fountains" just doesn't have the same ring to it.

A St. Patrick's Day letter of unknown origin that has been in my family archives for some time

I believe the man who wrote this letter was the cousin of my great-uncle. I am not sure. All I know is that all of these things really happened.

How To Smoke Smarties

I have a long history with Smarties. My mom used to keep a jar of them on top of the refrigerator, which I often hit up on the sly. I liked Smarties so much that I couldn't help but go back for "just one more" several times a day (while supplies lasted, which wasn't long considering I had several younger brothers who also had a taste for the sweet stuff). This was around the same time we first had a D.A.R.E. officer come to our class and teach us about the dangers of substance abuse and addiction, which I became convinced I had developed with "America's favorite candy wafer roll."

Nowadays I look back on that misplaced fear with amusement. To the growned-up me, Smarties are synonymous with childhood innocence. At least until I saw this video a kid did of "how to smoke Smarties," which I should probably find horrifying but actually think is kind of cute...


And lest you think that I'm contributing to or celebrating the delinquency of young people, take it from the kid himself: "It doesn't kill you, it doesn't hurt at all. It's just...smoking Smarties."

(video reblogged from Bottom Line Communications, illustration taken from smarties.com)

Film Music

I'm going to be posting some more songs on the lukebox this weekend, but for now here's a track from my favorite obscure group of the moment, Family Fodder. The group was led by a lady named Media Fodder and her three brothers, Tod, Rod and God. I'm not sure if those are their real names. I remember the song above back when it came out in 1981 and I was the tender age of zero. Those were different times.

Hope you have a nice weekend and see you next week.

Stewart vs. Cramer

Good analysis of the Jon Stewart vs. CNBC segement from Will Bunch...

The First Amendment doesn't say anything about not being funny, or not being passionate. I don't know about you, if you actually watched the piece, but I feel like I learned something important -- confirming the cheerleading nature of the nation's most-watched source for business news, even in a moment of oncoming disaster -- but I also busted my gut laughing as I did. And there's nothing wrong with that, informing and entertaining at the same time -- isn't that what newspapers are charging people 75 cents for?.

What battered newsrooms can learn from Stewart's CNBC takedown (full article plus link to video)

Tonight should be interesting.

Tallgrass roads

Following Jimbo into the Thousand Acre Pasture (I think) at Silkville Ranch in Williamsburg, Kansas last Sunday. I would have felt bad about plowing over this native prairie grass until I found out it was all going to be burned in a few weeks anyway. So the cycle can repeat itself. There are a lot more varieties of native Kansas grasses than I would have guessed.

We'll post some more pictures from this set soon.

"It is what it is"

If you've been in the country anytime in the the past five years or so, you've probably heard the phrase "it is what it is." People use it constantly. On one hand it's one of those meaningless verbal shrugs that serves to wrap up a conversation, along the lines of "I hear ya" or "what are you gonna do?" On the other, it actually does mean something. Perhaps that the subject in question must be taken at face value, or that it must be dealt with without harboring any illusions about it what it might be but isn't. Urban Dictionary has no less than 16 definitions. Or, to quote from this assessment of the phrase on flak magazine, " 'It is what it is' can also be an agent of insinuation, a coy refusal to spell out something that the speaker clearly thinks goes without saying." This brief analysis of the phrase led me to make a few diagrams which I reduced to the mini concrete poem above. I don't expect it to win any awards, but it was a helpful exercise in exorcising that seemingly ubiquitous phrase from my head for at least a few minutes. Nothing groundbreaking, but you know what they say...

Right now, in the office...

Award-winning cartoonist Stephan Pastis is in John's office holding a red-streaked kleenex to his nose. There's been a lot of yelling and commotion going on for the better part of an hour.

I would be worried, but the fact that Stephan just borrowed a red felt-tip pen from me a few minutes ago puts my mind at ease...somewhat.

Wait...it looks like someone's filming the whole thing, too. Apparently they're making a promo for the 12th "Pearls Before Swine" collection.

Update: Stephan just stuck his head out (still covered in "bloody" tissue) and told me to carry on like I don't have any idea what's going on. Which shouldn't be too hard considering I don't, really.

Uh-oh...the shouting is escalating. The office door is open and the argument is moving this way. I'd better get going before it's too late...

(re-blogged from the syndicate editor's blog. Just wanted to give you a first-hand account of what goes on at my work if I stay late enough)

Broken Windows

If you enjoyed the Costco post but were left wanting even more hard-hitting journalism, here's a classic article that actually addresses some serious aspects of urban life. This essay by George L. Kelling and James Q. Wilson from the March 1982 Atlantic Monthly uses a single broken window as a metaphor for why people should care about their neighborhoods. If you find it interesting, there are some links to other articles by them on the Atlantic sidebar.

I'd also recommend checking out this book by William Julius Wilson, written in 1996 but no less relevant today (nice lil summary on this college student's site). As he said then, "The problems we see today are going to be a hell of a lot worse in 10 years if we're not willing to face up to them. These kids are just not going to be absorbed into the economy, so what are they going to be doing? Well, we know. They're going to be making life pretty miserable for a lot of people."

And yes, that picture was taken in my old apartment after someone broke the window to the back bedroom, which was thankfully never used as such.

Cum 2 Costco

While driving out to the ranch yesterday I noticed that the parking lot of the Costco in Lenexa was completely full. It definitely looked like the place to be on a suburban Sunday afternoon. Having never been inside a Costco, I could only speculate as to what kinds of magical bulk item sales were taking place. Fortunately, I was able to draw on the research of Big Baby T, whose recent adventures at a Seattle Costco will likely be up for several journalism and blogger awards when 2009 draws to a close. Aside from a couple of parenthetical comments, all cellphone pics and captions here have been provided by Tara.


this person fOUND so many grRRRRRRReat dealz and stuff that it wouldnt even fit in a cart! good thing costco provides these for your shopping ease


need to use the internet? why relax at a coffee shop or your local library when U CAN CUM TO COSTCO AND LAPTOP ALL DAY ALL THE TIME 247272424/27 IN TRISTAN RECLINER RECLINERZ SO COMFORTABLE OMGOMG LOOSE WAIGHT NOW AND GET YOUR DEGREE AT THE SAME TIME ALL AT
COOOOOOOOOSTCO


Inviting u to try this delicious sample... Srsl it is so good only 5.39$$$$$$$$ (so tasty you'll need a surgeon's mask)


This. Is. Real.
(for some hilarious commentary on the "Costket," see this clip of Kansas City's Chris Porter on Last Comic Standing...Costco bit starts at about 2:37)


for all of your toilet paper needs cum to costco asap


cute lil baby
unfortunately, my cell phone camera could not capture the outstanding photoshop job on this package of super couches(?)


i cum to costco for lunch every day 2 get my beef hot dawg

Thanks again Big Baby for the wonderful tour.
See you at Costco. (Or Not-sco.)

oh my greenness

The new issue of Urban Times is out in newsstands now around the Plaza, Westport and downtown. There are some good stories and photos, among them a feature about the rebuilding of Greensburg, Kansas, which was hit by a tornado a few years back. Jenn and I collaborated for a story about where to go outdoors in the area, which is a useful piece if you'd ever like to find any of the spots where we take some of the nature pictures that have been posted here and at jennybros.com over the years. You can find our piece at the end of the PDF found under the Arts & Entertainment tab on the sidebar of the Urban Times site.

This is the second piece we've done for the magazine, which is a neat publication considering the staff is made up of local writers, photogs and designers who all have different day jobs and backgrounds. Aside from the publisher's decision to endorse Wayne Cauthen as the man of the year in the last issue, the mag generally focuses less on politics and more on spotlighting downtown businesses, community initiatives and urban development, which I find refreshing even if I'm not exactly the downtown revival's biggest cheerleader.

Speaking of "going green," I think I might go get some chinese food. To compensate for that sentence making no sense, I'll sign off with one of my favorite photographic illustrations of how to go green.

Inspired by meeting someone who will be turning 30 on the day the world is supposed to end

The traveler girl gets a tattoo on her neck of 2012
and by sunrise on December 22 of that year
the Apocalypse
still has not happened

The tattoo, however, will remain
She has only 9 days left
to do something worthy of this skin-art
commemoration
as the rest of her life has been spent
anticipating the paradigm shift

So what should she do?

28

My boy Matt, a blogger and professional church sign designer, posted a nice track in honor of my becoming the latest member of the 28 club.

It's nice to be respectable, saintly, sweet and fair. But I don't want to finish up alone in a rocking chair.

More on numbers, superstition and the apocalypse in my next post.

Waking up at the wheel

Sorry it's been so silent around here, folks. It's just that up until now it's been so cold. I go outside for a smoke and by the time I come back my fingers are all frozen. Easy solution: stop smoking, right? Well lest the American Cancer Society join the long list of public institutions lobbying to get this blog permanently shut down, let me just add that I do not endorse smoking. It's just that a cig here and there with a glass of Broadbent 5-year Malmsey (only 20 bucks at Gomers) can be rejuvenating on a cold, late night.

Another thing is that I was re-reading the Bacchae (please hold your knock-knock jokes about Euripides until the end of the performance) and I couldn't help but notice Teiresias's chastisement of impudent young Pentheus:

But you are glib; your phrases come rolling out
smoothly on the tongue, as though your words were wise
instead of foolish. The man whose glibness flows
from his conceit of speech declares the thing he is:
a worthless and stupid citizen.

Before you think I'm just beating up on myself here, I'm talking about the collective droning and blather of the online masses to which we all contribute in one form or another almost daily. So many words, so little substance. Maybe that's another reason I still enjoy newspapers. They're tangible. You can draw faces on the text and photos when they piss you off.

With blogging, it's tough to find the right middle ground between being uncomfortably forthcoming and totally guarded. Personal blogs are like newspapers about one person, which is why I love them and also why I loathe them. No sooner have I shaken my fist at someone else's site for being sloppy or uninteresting than I go back to my own computer/flight console and write about what I'm having for dinner (braised clams in parsley broth, AGAIN) or something I overheard at the grocery store ("Sir, please stop assaulting the other customers with our delicious biscotti samples").

Plenty of times in the past few years I've thought I should apply my writing energies elsewhere. Newspapers (still) are more reputable, magazines are more attractive, and hand-written scrolls of poetry do more to impress the woolgathering housewives in my sonnet-writing workshop. But when it comes to free, instantaneous, and easy-to-distribute publishing, blogging can't be beat.

I've read that blogs are going out of fashion and giving way to more micro-bloggy, networky things like Twitter and Facebook, but I think that just makes me like blogs even more. I used to lament that the word "blog" sounded awful, like a booger, fecal log or a case of the pukes, but compared to "twitter tweets," the word "blog" contains a venerable ugliness that I feel comfortable with. The blogosphere is like the neighborhood bar where everyone gets sloppy and runs their mouths even though nobody remembers anything the next day. Probably healthier to avoid, but staying home isn't any fun either.

So I plan to keep blogging, even if this first post in a while is nothing but a blog post about how I plan to keep blogging. In the coming weeks you'll be seeing a lot of the same stuff I've always posted here, including shaggy-dog stories, transcriptions of fever dreams, fake headlines, mini-travelogues, photo adventures, haiku, music and food links, and perhaps even some more original art.

One thing I'll probably try to do is decouple this blog from any specific sense of place. I know that maintaining an illusion is a writer's primary task, but trying to present Kansas City as a perennially exciting place to spend your twenties is more than even I can bear. After living in KCMO for over three years, I find myself cycling through the same tired observations and storylines. Somebody gets shot. Another favorite cafe, venue or guitar store closes down. The tax guy dressed up as the statue of liberty puts down his signs and sits down at the intersection for a cigarette. The beat goes on.

I'm sure I'll still mention local happenings and will continue to place-drop as much as possible, but from now on I'm going to make very little effort to be factual, relevant, hip, grammatically correct or in any way tied to reality. If you're going to blog, you might as well take advantage of the fact that there are no rules and nobody cares.

On that note, feel free to chime in if you have any suggestions for content you'd like to see more of. And have a good day.

Thanks for reading and come back soon.

LDHW

Dilla had Donuts, Wetzel had Pretzels

If you've come here lately, you might have started to get the feeling that this site was a vacant storefront. Well, it's not entirely far from the truth, as this photo can tell you. As you've probably already read in the community papers, I'd been using a Wetzel's Pretzels franchise location in a run-down Missouri mall to sell scraps of haiku poetry and old blog posts, but as anyone in this dubious industry knows, it's sometimes best to keep a move on. So I apologies for the lack of fresh, salted or cinnamon-coated content, but I assure you there will be more in the future. 27 was a good year, and I plan to enjoy the final fortnight or so, but for 28 I think I'll have to ramp it up a notch. So be sure to check back by early March to see which directions things take.

In the meantime I'm heading to St. Louis with Jenny to stay at the Hilton on the Mississippi. I plan to swim, hit up the city museum, and perhaps visit an old mill or sculpture park along the way.



See you soon.

them books is wrong

Fort Case

According to the inscription at the statue at Case Point:

When Lewis and Clark stopped at this spot on September 15, 1806, atop a high bluff with a sweeping view of the Missouri River Valley, they noted that the site offered a "commanding situation for a fort."

The sign notes that although the site overlooking the mouth of the Kansas River seemed like an ideal spot for a fort, no fort was ever built here.



Last week, however, I found evidence to the contrary. Sure, it's nothing too formidable from a military standpoint, but the careful arrangement of sticks and plastic shows a lot of ingenuity went into the making of this structure.



So, you see, there is a fort at Case Point after all. And yes, I did have ethical qualms about sharing this online, but considering it's on public land that's viewable from the highway, and in light of its historical significance, I opted to go ahead and post it.

Another fun fact about Lewis and Clark's journey through this area. It was near this place that Clark saw a dazzling sight -- an immense flock of Carolina parakeets. This was the first documented sighting of these now extinct birds west of the Mississippi.

Must have been pretty.

Brothers Gotta Live

(photo by Jill Toyoshiba, KC Star)

Although you probably wouldn't know it, this blog started partially out of a frustration with crime in the city, which at the time I'd just moved back to. I wound up deciding instead to write about the frivolous, fun and attractive aspects of life in Midtown and KC in general (and beyond) but I've always remained somewhat preoccupied with the violence that goes on nearby; fascinated with how far removed these kinds of things are from my reality and yet how close they are to where I live.

Of course, I haven't offered any solutions, and my own involvement in helping improve the city's situation has been mostly non-existent, aside from a bit of online hand-wringing. I aim to change that in the future, though I don't know exactly how just yet.

One voice that stands out to me is Midtown Miscreant, a local writer who many of you might have seen featured in the Pitch Weekly cover story last month. He doesn't profess to having the answers either, but he does draw attention to crimes and call folks to task for their actions or lack of accountability. His posts about the recent vandalism of monuments, churches and other inanimate objects by so-called "anarchists" have been particularly strong.

As fun as it can be to live near the Art Institute and amid the cheaper apartment housing that's home to so many students and twentysomethings, I wonder what's up with some of these kids. The other day a couple of girls I know who are a few years younger were talking about how a guy threw a molotov cocktail into an abandoned building next to Harlings. "Yeah," the girl said. "It's awesome."

What? Awesome? Starting a fire in an abandoned building and then running away? Yeah, it's just about as courageous as the folks that broke windows at the nearby Obama office three times during the campaign.

I just wonder when people started equating anarchy with property damage, as if that's all there is to it.

After last week's destruction at a 100-year-old church in the neighborhood, I was upset, just like a lot of other area residents. I figured if I came across one of these kids in action it would be somewhat satisfying to personally put a stop to it. But of course my mother did not raise me to hit nobody, and the chances of encountering them in the first place is unlikely.

Instead of becoming some kind of vigilante, I'd rather challenge these kids to reexamine how exactly they go about trying to introduce "change" and revolution to the world. To quote Joseph Campbell:

"Revolution doesn't have to do with smashing something, it has to do with bringing something forth. If you spend all your time thinking about that which you are attacking, then you are negatively bound to it. You have to find the zeal in yourself and bring that out."

Now, about the murder issue...

I was pleased to see the Star's Tony Rizzo and photographer Jill Toyoshiba do such a great job on in the three-part feature called "Murder Factory," which is about life and death in the neighboring zip code, which produces more murderers than anywhere else in the state. Say what you will, the story addresses some difficult subjects -- interviewing murderers, their families, those who have lost children, had their homes riddled by gunfire, seen their streets go from respectable neighborhoods to overgrown, nightmarish crime zones. The series raises some tough questions, and the photo essay alone is worth spending some time looking through.

The final part, which ran today, examines real cost of crime (16 million to incarcerate 100 people for 10 years) vs. the ways some of that money could be spent to help prevent crime, with programs in Newark, NJ and Boston used as an example. The article also addresses how it's no so much evil as it is indifference that allows these kinds of crime to continue with such frequency (i.e. Hannah Arendt's idea of the banality of evil).

I drive through 64130 quite a bit, usually en route to Swope or somewhere like that, and while I don't make a point to spend time there, I don't want to ignore it. The only times I've spent much time in the Ivanhoe neighborhood was while volunteering for a housing rehab project as part of "Christmas in October." I remember being in the basement of an elderly black couple working on repairing a staircase or something and seeing a sticker on one of the beams that must have been placed there a few decades ago. It was some kind of affirmation about the need for unity in the black community. Though I don't remember exactly what it said, the last lines were "Brothers don't got to die. Brothers got to LIVE."

I probably won't be discussing crime here much in the future, as I plan to completely change the format of this site and do something different than the infrequent commentary and event and photo stuff I've put up in the past. But for now I'm glad that people are talking about what's going on. In the future I hope it leads to more actions being taken and real change being brought forth by those of us who live in Kansas City. Even if we don't live in the middle of the roughest patches, that doesn't mean we shouldn't do our part to help improve the situations of our brothers to the east.

respectfully,

LW

in the realm of obscure feeling

Tomorrow I get to see a performance of one of my favorite symphonies of all time. (Never mind that I only really know a handful, it's still my favorite)

About five years ago, Mahler's 1st ("The Titan," as it's called) was essentially burned into my brain, mostly by accident. I had meticulously packed a set of about two dozen CDs for a train trip, but when I got onboard I realized I'd remembered my discman and headphones but forgot the travel case of discs. When I popped the CD player open I saw that it was a copy of Mahler's first that I'd picked up a few months before. It was a long and stormy train ride, and I never forgot it.

My introduction to Mahler actually took place before that, during my sophomore year at college. My roommate Pat was a music student, and even though he specialized in the French horn, he often fell asleep at the piano after hours of playing classical pieces I'd never heard of. I'd sit nearby in the parlor of the scholarship hall, entranced by the intricate and inspired melodies that carried us both to the end of the night. "Who was that?" I'd ask Pat at a pause in his playing. More often than not it was Mahler.

I'm no Mahler scholar, but my two favorites are probably the first and the ninth symphonies, especially when conducted by the composer's personal friend, Bruno Walter or some other reputable conductor like Leondard Bernstein. Even if I was an expert on classical music, I'd still probably refrain from writing anything else about him here. As Mahler himself said about a hundred years ago,

"Let the public have its own thoughts about the work performed. Let it not be forced to read during the performance, let no preconceived ideas be instilled into it! If a composer has of himself impressed upon his listeners the feelings that surged through him, his object has been attained. The speech of tones has then approached that of words; but it has infinitely more to impart than words can express."

If you go to NYtimes.com and do a search for Mahler, you can actually pull up PDFs of the original articles such as this one about Mahler's work being performed in the U.S. for the first time.

If you're in the KC area, there might still be some tickets for Friday or Saturday night. I know if you're a student with an ID you can sometimes show up and get a $5 dollar rush seat. Doesn't always work, but it's worth a try. Whether you've got a strong interest in the composer, a fascination with timpani drums or are just looking for a classy place to zone out, you'll likely enjoy some aspect of watching the KC Symphony under Michael Stern. More info at kcsymphony.org.

Until then, I'll give the final word to Mahler, from the end of the previously linked-to 1908 NY Times article:

"I, for one, know well that, so long as my life happenings can be conveyed fitly through words, I will not use them as a musical theme. The longing to express myself musically comes over me only in the realm of obscure feelings, at the threshold of the world beyond, the world in which the categories of time and space rule no more."

Inauguration photos

To make up for the nonsensical video I posted last night, here's a pretty amazing photo series put together by the Boston Globe of the inauguration and people viewing it around the world. Found this through Matt.

When Dinosaurs ruled the earth

As I'm posting this, it only has 287 views. I bet it has a lot more tomorrow. What's funny is I came across it by accident. I was trying to find the no voice-over BBC footage of the Obamas bidding the Bushes fairwell, which is itself a very moving piece of footage. Like a propaganda film played in reverse, not without a certain amount of hope and goodwill. Instead I found this clip dubbed over with dialogue from "Jurassic Park." I have to admit, though, the fanfare does strike a certain chord.

Godspeed.

At the CVS on Main

Today at the downtown CVS I was about to tell the guy "no, I don't have a CVS card" when a lady behind me raced up to volunteer to swipe hers for me. I told her it was no big deal, figuring there probably weren't a lot of savings in my $10 purchase of Dunkin Sticks, cough drops, Sweet Tart Hearts and disposable razors. But she insisted. "We're all each others' keeper, it says so in the bible," she said. "With this economy the way it is, we could all be living together next week."

So we swiped her card and I got a coupon about a mile long that ostensibly will save me four and a half bucks next time I visit CVS.

Downtown yesterday

I was coming out of the city market yesterday after buying a bratwurst a pepsi and some cookies full of figs and crushed walnuts and in front of us were two cops on horseback. This guy with dreads had come out to one of the patios for a smoke and right when we went outside we heard him yell "Oh man those some HORSES, dog! Those some HORSES!" The cops reigned in their steeds and talked to the guy for a bit, who said every weekend in the summer he goes to ride and hang out with the 25 horses he has on a farm in Oklahoma. Just before that I'd seen two female police offers on horseback right at my place of employment at 12 and Walnut. I guess that's one thing downtown KC has going for it -- we still have law enforcement on horseback.

Linkage

"It comes from a deep-rooted conviction that if there is anything worthwhile doing for the sake of culture, then it is touching on subject matters and situations which link people, and not those that divide people. There are too many things in the world which divide people, such as religion, politics, history, and nationalism. If culture is capable of anything, then it is finding that which unites us all. And there are so many things which unite people. It doesn't matter who you are or who I am, if your tooth aches or mine, it's still the same pain. Feelings are what link people together, because the word 'love' has the same meaning for everybody. Or 'fear', or 'suffering'. We all fear the same way and the same things. And we all love in the same way. That's why I tell about these things, because in all other things I immediately find division."

-- Polish filmmaker Krzystof Kieslowski, in a 1995 interview

I just watched the Double Life of Veronique last night. I think I like the Polish Weronika better than the French Veronique. Even though the film came out a decade or so before "Amelie," it's hard not to think of it during the Parisian scenes.

Anyway I liked this quote from KK. Especially on inauguration eve.

Alligator on bun

For those of you who can read German, Moritz, my "Brat-Bruder in Lederhosen," wrote a great travelogue about his tour of hot dog stands in Los Angeles.

Polish up your track jackets

TONIGHT

workfare incorporated benefit concert @ czar bar

featuring

winston apple
katlyn conray
tony ladesich
&
SLOW BROS (jake blanton & andrew connor)

show starts at 7, slow bros go on at 9:30.

It's All About The Introduction

These songs all more than stand on their own, but in each case the introductions in these music vids kick things off on the right foot.

Here's Taj Mahal...



I used to think it was just practice I needed to make me a better mouth-harp player, maybe one of those cool Pignose mics that Red has. But now I know a handful of fancy rings helps. I love this song. Used to play it on the radio.



How cool would it be to be introduced by The Big O? I feel nervous for Eric at first...for a white guy (hell, for anyone) those are some tough shoes to fill. But he does a good job, never minding the head bobs.


"Bridging not only the generation gap, but the geography gap." Skip Spence is a lot of fun to watch as well.

Kaleidoscope

The other night while searching for Matthias Grunewald paintings I somehow found this kaleidoscopic photo rendition of St. Mary's Basilica in Krakow. Photo by Keitology, whose other work includes colorful landscapes, nudes and a brain wearing headphones.

An Erinaceidae for the books

I've never given too much thought to the idea of having a spirit animal. If somebody asked me in the past I probably would have said "pterodactyl" or something either prehistoric or fictitious. But if I gave it some thought I would have to say that my spirit animal is a hedgehog.

I encountered hedgehogs quite a bit (usually at night) back in Lawrence and also in Rhineland-Westphalia, where a hedgehog is known as an "Igel". Whenever I saw them I treated them with respect, and I think hedgehogs and I usually had a pretty good (if silent) understanding of each other.

So it's with great delight that I read this scoop from the KC Star about Lawrence overturning its ban on having a pet hedgehog within city limits. The story chronicles the legal campaign of a kid named Justin, and when you reach the story's conclusion you'll see that my symbolic adoption of the animal isn't without some cosmic merit.

In addition, my friends at Zoroastrian Kids point out that the hedgehog is a sacred animal created by none other than Ahura Mazda.

My affinity for the critter also stems from one of my favorite poems in the German language, Kurt Marti's "Das Herz der Igel" (The Heart of a Hedgehog, translated into English if you scroll down a bit here).

Any other hedgehog-related trivia can be sent here via the comments section. Otherwise, hope you're having a good year so far.

Cheers.

LW

tones from 2009

Some strumming from the other day...

(with apologies to Mr. Fahey)

Image courtesy of T-Bit, who recently completed her year-long illustration cycle.

What about you? What's up your sleeve?