found this in a recent notebook:

"Much too loose
Bad for the Goose
All around town
Planes are the ground.

Pronouns last stand
Whereever we am
Outlast the dawn
Heaven's last song

As long as we're here
Have another beer
Distance in the night
Another oversight

Spirit of the Air
Breeze's everywhere
Do what you want
It's just another jaunt
Not enough to lose
Accept it or refuse."

raw day outside. seems like the last of winter is the only winter we've had this year.

i could be wrong. i've noticed that talking to people about the weather, this year's, last year's, i seem to be out of context and really cannot relate to what i'm hearing. expecting some snow tonight. but compared to some of the white-out zones i've driven thru, the black ice, i think it's fair to say the winters are diminishing here.

i'm pretty down lately, physically beat. house is a disaster, can't face cleaning it up. so i'm doing mechanical no-thought things, like sorting my socks. just kidding.

that's something i'll do when i return to a semblance of health.

man i feel bad. do not like plastic teeth. doesn't fit, too tight, hurts like hell. haven't eaten anything but yoghurt and ice cream since wednesday. now i read that having no teeth increases chance of cardiac mishap, and my chances are sky high already.

so i'm going to buy some kind of juicer or food processor (smasher) today. see the dentist tomorrow.

the week has been slow, and so have i. about the only thing i did was come close to finishing 80 plus page PDF for lulu.com.

it's early in the morning, i've been up for a long time. nearly finished zelda by nancy mitford. this is a very strange book. nobody in it looks too good, especially f. scott who comes across as some kind of elegant idiot savant.

while i'm on the subject, also reading the future of ice by gretel ehrlich. nice oblique sentences, no narrative in sight. a subject you can't quite pinpoint. my kind of book.

meetings with remarkable men by gurdieff. reading this like a national geographic, in no particular order.

a mind apart by antonetta. about the necessity for what she calls neurodiversity. eccentric unpredictable paragraphs. i like it.

parallel worlds by kaku. newton, einstein, quantum, string theory and m-theory. pretty lucid, lots of history.

timeline by chrichton. read about half, probably won't finish. like reading a movie, everything is cued ahead of time so you know what to expect.

off to the pharmacy.

mmm... sunday about noon. yesterday was too weird. i finished oil painting of angel person, immediately began watercolor. busy around the house, coolish weather so i decided to walk downtown, buy a small sketchbook that fits in my pack, walk back.

about halfway to town my new uppers began to pulsate pain. hurt. not too bad but noticeable. so i got some kind of drugstore creamy made for this kind of problem, walked home, took the damn things out and applied medication. then horizontal for a long time. mr syntax dropped by. we had interesting chat. and i gave him rough mix and probably last mix of muxak i've been so involved with lately. it is both interesting and curious that the source of creativity that produced the CD was cleaning house and throwing things away.

in some ways not recognized very much anymore, life can be considered a time during which, if you are of the blessed, you lose everything before you die. in a deep ecological and respecter of life way.

anyway i'm back in invalid mode because i cannot wear this half-set of dentures.

pic above today's special, you're not supposed to be able to read it.

ok ok i didn't walk to town yesterday. after lunch i took a dive and a long nap, then went to bed early. and to think years earlier i would have been out riding the waves, getting the word on where what was, and making the circuits. circus?

new book cobra I about the "run up" to bush's war. it interests me because i have felt during this slow motion debacle that the U.S. military has the best handle on what is happening and have been totally shut out by the troika that owns us, bush-chaney-rumsfield.

ever worked for a company where meetings to make decisions are charades at best? i have, more than one. in fact this situation has become a stereotype of our day, and in it you quickly learn to shut up, stay half-awake and agree to whatever the big man's hallucination of the hour is. you do not point out false assumptions, logical cul-de-sacs, or unmentioned show-stoppers.

the nation is being run this way. there was plenty of disagreement to the war before the war, and i don't just mean me. (my caveat was messing with an unknown culture, people that we have never known, and not knowing that this was the case pretty much guaranteed failure.

but the nay-sayers - note how in the context of our culture that attribute sounds so negative - were fired, dismissed, or otherwise ignored.

the concern is not that the nation screwed up a war, but that their mode of operation means anything the junta touches, deaf dumb and blind to the world we live in, will be at the least ineffective and more likely just plain destructive.

why were the democrats, the artists, the musicians, the small businesses, the little people so silent during "run up"? same reason those at a business meeting run by an autocrat are silent, they fear for their daily bread.

let's do better now that we are engaged in the "run-down" of of the war. and all institutions run by fear.

for a year or two i have been posting a picture a day here, usually done on the spot. it's been a great exercise.

now i feel like it is time to return to the written word. why? to see if i have anything to say. besides i'm redoing the art archive, dividing it into genres like watercolor, oil, pencil, photo, computer generated and so on.

then - and i dread this - enlarge the picture that you see when you click on the thumbnail.

it's early in the day and i'm about to walk downtown to get a portable - small - sketchbook i can tote around.

now as far as the written word goes, let's take a look at the word "war". since the enlightenment to vietnam, "war" has usually meant hostilities between nation-states.

the military of the nations involved do the fighting.

bush's war is a redefinition. the enemy is "terror".

it is worth noting that about 150 years ago in the west there were bearded bombers running around blowing things up. they were called "anarchists".

no war was declared against them. instead they were considered criminals.

personally, if i were a millenial politician i would declare war against nightmares, boom-boxes, and TV.

this is a time that institutions are fading away: schools, local govt., church, medical and nation-states don't seem to work like they once did.

institutions have evolved throughout history, and evolution means change now. to something new. new affinity groups. new tribes, bands. new families. and most of all, new ways of organizing collective human effort not based on fear, jobs or money.

i like this one better.

[10 seconds later] no i don't.

close up of an oil painting i have been screwing around with. it's a (sort-of) vague copy of a painting by thayer, english, around a hundred years ago. it's not finished.

every time i start an oil painting i can count on learning a lot of things because i'm always involved with something i've never done before. on this one it's painting with very small brushes.

got all my upper teeth removed yesterday and a denture slapped in. something else i've never done before. the dentist absolutely refused to have them made from stainless steel so i was a little disappointed. now i'm just in pain. later.

to the dentist at 10:30 this morning. all of my upper teeth will be extracted and - the picture in my mind says - a dental plate will be shoved in my mouth and i'm out of there. the visceral unease i feel is both very strong and a surprise to me. i imagine there will be a lot of surprises. postings to this conglomeration will most likely be minimal for a few days. wish me luck.

stepped outdoors and took this picture last night
here's my plan: today i have an appt w/ doc at 9:30. then a stop at the old fashioned pharmacy to fill a prescription. then if, as they say, time allows, an oil change for truck. back home pay bills.

tomorrow morning i'm getting all my upper teeth pulled and replaced with, not sure what you call it, an upper denture. (lower denture comes a little later).

finish a little movie i have been working on in flash. work on an oil that i have totally screwed up but learned a lot working on. i seem to be at a point where loading brush and brush strokes are coming into play.

have finished rough mix of latest CD, not a total success. it's much quieter than past work, maybe even a little "new age", but there are enough - i hope - weird sonic convolutions to keep it interesting.

i took this foto yesterday. it reminds me of goya.

on a ramble in the woods i ran across this character. someday we'll all live this way. if we all live. turns out he played tenor with basie and then hit the dream forest.

dang. can't remember a thing about yesterday, except it was normal day, ie stayed inside painted, mastered another CD, freed up disk space.

am i in creative rut?

who cares. i don't. trying to start a group blog of cohorts from chapel hill in the 60's. never counted on so many unable to traverse the maze of establishing an account on blogger.com. (it is pretty straight forward).

just dropped truck off to have new distributer "o" ring replaced.

beautiful day so i walked back, maybe 2 1/2 miles. first long walk this year. and it's already too hot for my system. (i run hot).

today's idiotgram comes from book that i am putting together. it is a mega wing-ding done in flash.

change oil, groceries, see what is leaking under my truck, really try and make drinking liberally downtown tonight, it starts around 7, a little late for me, but i have to start leaving the house. it's a mental health maintenance thing. i think i'll path thermal mattress i keep in truck for the delightful camping opportunities that are right around the corner.

plus in my living room right now are huge piles of fotos i want to sort thru, ditto 4 track cassettes i need to pitch, and a fat pile of papers i have made notes on over the years on subjects like how to play the guitar in open g - Spanish - tuning with the bottom string removed. this task is dictated by the lighten up prime directive.

and billz, balance checkbook.

another day in the floating life.

one of those. . . days. didn't, couldn't sleep last night, a periodic happening. got up and continued to pound out sounds out of bigger sounds and free up disk space. painted a little on current oil, i'm getting into it. at 2 i went to cardiologist for stress test and blew it away, tech said i was in the active 33 year old numbers. swung by dr. lane's to pick up button cover for pump.

it's 5:30 in the evening. think i'll rearrange all the furniture.

today's icon from a photo i took downtown day before yesterday i believe.

got this email this morning from armor folks:

"...He also has a campaign site at www.armorforcongress.com.

A lot of his writings are there as well.

Did I read what you said correctly?

I don't believe for a minute that he didn't know what the Eighth
Amendment was-- he's a attorney who specializes in constitutional
issues, for crying out loud!"

perhaps i neglected to fill in the context. the question was sort of a stunt, and the lack of instant response on the part of all in the room (at least myself), including mr. armor, means absolutely nothing. the least political of us could have refreshed our memory in a second with all the laptops present.

in my book no one is expected to drag around all details in his or her head 24/7. knowing where to find them, how to use them, yes. i work with dozens of computer apps every day but away from the computer would be hard-pressed to rattle of keyboard commands.

i suppose such a small incident could be blown up by the noise excuse me i meant news in say a presidential election.

mr armor seemed to get a kick out of it as did we all, which says more about a busy muti-tasking man than what he has memorized and when.

of course he knows what the eighth amendment is.

this reflects on one of the many problems institutional democracies face today: communication. i sympathize with, let's say a human being of good intention running for office today. i imagine a situation where as one converses there may be faint anticipatory echoes from the public domain: practicalities of the process keep the discourse constrained, so "handlers" keep a man from speaking his mind, which, lord knows, is difficult enough with everybody living on his own planet.

the meeting last night with John Armor, republican challenger to charles taylor, the entrenched congressman from western north carolina, was the result of efforts of BlogAsheville and Scrutiny Hooligans. turnout was light, presumably on account of the politically enlightened's relunctance to talk to the bad guys. Brainshrub.com was present and pushed hard for answers.

his question of the day was pretty neat: he asked gordon to pick a number. he picked "8". he then asked mr. armor what the 8th amendment was. (backgound: he said he had always wanted to ask a candidate this question). if it had been "jeopardy", nobody in the room including mr. armor would have rung in.

i had been pushing oil paint around all day and was late. i was set for conversation but quickly reset as it was more like a question and answer interview. he came across as a free market no government messing around with biz deals (like charlie), but one with integrity. in other words it appears as if he will run in the primaries against taylor as "i am of the right but not a crook". i have to say i admire his willingness to mingle with the hoi polloi, a quality missing from almost every politician in high office.

watercolor, 2 weeks ago.

happy birthday to mr. c who is taking it easy at his spread in chatham county.

watched the unc dook game last night, the first basketball game i've seen all year. i picked a good one, a classic that will be remembered a long time.

lost a rubber seal off my insulin pump. if i can't find it i'll be on the phone messing with fed ex and lord knows what, an exercise i shy away from. on the other hand the duct tape seems to work fine.

LATER<==== worked on a sound and a painting all day. time slipped away and i realized i was due for a meeting with the gentleman who wants to beat chainsaw charlie in the republican primaries, john armor.

yep, it's true. came home and finished sound, gained about a 1 1/2 GB disk space.

photo taken looking in back window of doug's place near toe river yesterday.

had a good evening painting and off loading music files.

most of yesterday spent riding with doug up to toe river and spending a few hours at camp. great break, all in order up there, the air and the wind were enough all by themselves to go.

photo my son eric sent me from st. george utah. he and angela live in sunnyvale and took a trip to utah to visit her mother and new husband. it sounds as if it has been "discovered" and well off californians are pouring in. there may be some small high-tech industries that are migrating there also.

last 24 hours have been a real hassel. i don't even want to write about it. the sudden low i had at the doc's office yesterday morning seemed to linger on all day: felt like i "was not myself". lay down in the after noon.

doug stopped by around 5 and we spent an hour or so catching up. i was still feeling a little shakey so i skipped carolina virginia game at steve's, went to bed early.

after going to the head about 5 times during the night, and not sleeping much, i finally figured out infusion set had detached so at 5 this morning changed sets and gave myself correction bolus for 500 BG.

it's almost 9 and i'm down to 353 (and up and out of bed). another correction, i guess by 10 i'll be able to eat. meanwhile getting battery alarm from insulin pump i have to take care of.

if i can get past all this biomedical frou-frou this morning i hope to drive with Doug up to toe river territory for the day which is another beautiful one, they're talking snow maybe by the week end.

since i wrote the above doug called, he's out eating breakfast and i'm getting myself together to hit the road.

scan of picture that i found in house we moved into in efland about 1970. it is some kind of die and fold paper similar to tie-dye. i don't know who did it. i refound it at sally's house when she died.

doc appt this morning. i did a correction bolus before i left the house, was fine when i got there, BG was 100 plus, and before i left i was acting goofy, remeasusred at 27 which was not pleasant. but it dropped that much in 20 minutes. now, about 5:00 i think is the first time all day sugar has been normal.

got a call from doug, he's headed up from old fort. talked to april who sent me some beautiful flowers. i couldn't figure out why. cause she thought it was my birthday. it used to be.