48 Laws of Sociopathy: Law 27

Play On People's Need To Believe To Create A Cultlike Following.
- excerpted from The 48 Laws of Power, by R. Greene

48 Laws of Sociopathy: Law 17

Keep Others In Suspended Terror: Cultivate An Air Of Unpredictability.
- excerpted from The 48 Laws of Power, by R. Greene

the deployed & posed

"Far from being fully accounted for and catalogued, (art) deploys and poses problems in several dimensions. In short, it is an 'open' situation, in movement. A work in progress."
-Umberto Eco

Squawky

Back when I taught creative writing to business-track undergrads on Monday nights, I would stay after class and draw a random weird creature on the chalk board for the Tuesday morning teacher - whoever that was. This was my ritual. Afterward, I'd pack up my shit and go to my guitar lesson. All this after a day of seeing clients, too. That was pure squawkin' craziness.

E.K. Blues

I'm playing a ballad for Emily Klinefelter, who recently announced her retirement from the world of female boxing. This is big news around these parts, because she has been ranked no. 1 in the world in her weight class and both she and her sister are forces of nature in the boxing ring. But back in February, after a vicious bout during which she received multiple blows to the head, she was kayoed in the third round at the Johnson County 4-H Fairgrounds by super bantamweight Christina Ruiz. Klinefelter was rushed to Iowa City, where doctors found that a blood vessel had burst in her brain. They had to cut her skull open to stop the bleeding. After surgery and recovery, she was released with a titanium plate in her head. Klinefelter fought a grand total of 96 matches. The February defeat that nearly sent her to the ethereal realm had been the first of her career. RESPECT.

Mama Spider

Ella & me drawing a picture while the great midwestern heat wave cooks creation. I asked wha' she was drawing. She said "A mama spider and a cave for her to live in." The idea of a spider-cave horrifies me, probably due to my traumatic, childhood exposure to episode #96 of Gilligan's Island on Ted Turner's Superstation. (In this episode, a giant, ridiculous, cave-dwelling spider tries - unsuccessfully, sadly - to off Gilligan.)

Milk & Cat Are Friends

Behold! A neighborhood grimalkin drinking Eleanor's chocolate milk on our back porch.