diorama of prehistoric time
good color combinations
live bloggin' thanksgiving pt 3
9:35 pm
Thanksgiving is a holiday that I have never truly understood. I mean, of course I understand the idea of taking a moment to stop to consider all the things you have to be thankful for, it’s just the way that it is practiced that I don’t truly understand. Seeing as we already live in a very glutinous society, the idea of taking a day off to really indulge in the finer things in life comes off to me as much more hedonistic than thankful. I know that traditionally, Thanksgiving has been an ‘unofficial’ religious holiday to give thanks to God for the bounties that (hopefully) came with the harvest season. But these days, with factory farming and all the fertilizers and pesticides, it barely feels right to be celebrating a harvest that we, as a society, take for granted and don’t really know anything about. I’d be all for having a “thank a farmer’ day, and think that it would be great if we, as a society, spent a day every year learning and thinking about where our food comes from. But instead we eat five times as much as we should, get drunk, argue with our in-laws, and watch football.
But I do agree with the basic concept that we all have a lot to be thankful for, it’s just that I think the way our country acknowledges the holiday plays off more like a bad joke than something sincere. How about a day of fasting? Or maybe we continue to spend all day in the kitchen making delicious meals, but then when the feast is finished we bring the food to some poor family or old folks who can’t get out of their homes? That seems to me to be such a more obvious way to reconcile a notion that we need to show gratitude for our excesses than sitting around all day gorging ourselves until we can’t eat anymore.
But I should probably stop complaining.
Lately it seems like there has been a bountiful harvest in the digital realm. While we are on the topic of giving thanks, let me declare my gratitude towards Jona for starting up Music-By-Friends-For-The-Radio; a wonderful internet radio show (pod-cast? I am so not hip with the lingo) that has turned on many people, myself included, to some great new music. I can’t stop listening to last weeks mix, and am particularly excited to have been introduced to the French electro-pop outfit o.lamm
I am also super stoked on the new digital pog revolution, brought into the world by Michael Bell-Smith and brought to my attention by our very own E-Rock. It is obvious that Digital Pogs will soon be everywhere; I just wonder how long will it be before some advertising agency totally rips-off the idea. And speaking of advertising agencies ripping off artists, I am very thankful that someone is finally making a huff about how blatantly the new Nissan Sentra commercials are ripping off (fellow Uncertain States of America) artist Matt Johnson’s piece Bread Face. (and thanks to Jeff Jahn for the heads up!)
While I am in the groove, I should probably announce my profound thanks for Urban Honking! UrHo is a great thing, and the opportunity to blog here is an honor. The dudes behind it work their behinds off, entirely on a volunteer basis. They could probably make a wad of cash if they decided to sell ads, but their choice not to shows their true dedication to this community. THANKS DUDES!!!
OKAY. IT IS TIME TO DEFROST THE TURKEY POT-PIE
live blogging thanksgiving pt 2
6:15 pm
IT is with a bittersweet joy that I tell you the wonderful news that Tess seems to have been adopted! Being a holiday and all, the adoption people had the day off so I was unable to confirm, but there was a new dog in her kennel today, and Tess was nowhere to be found. I hope and believe that she is probably with her new family right now, attentively waiting for falling crumbs underneath a dinning room table on which sits a great thanksgiving feast. Maybe her new owners have given her an orange bandana to celebrate the festive season, and it wouldn't surprise me one bit if she ends up having a better thanksgiving dinner than me. I was very much looking forward to seeing her today, but her adoption is truly something to be thankful for. (hey, who ever adopted her, just in case you read my blog please drop me a line!!!)
One thing that's for certain is she sure missed a crazy day at the humane society. It was a relative ghost town, with only a few key staff members and a small handful of volunteers on duty. The dogs were going totally bonkers, and getting them all out was wet and slow going. The kennel is jammed packed, with a current roster of 105 dogs, and since the humane society was closed today, the dogs didn't have the normal daily interaction with people coming in to look at them. The rain was relentless, and as the afternoon proceeded, the few volunteers that were there slowly started drifting away to the call of turkey dinners. By mid afternoon it was down to just me and one other volunteer named Kelly, we had both been there for a few hours and were totally soaked, but there were still about 30 dogs needing to get out and neither of us had any big dinner plans to run off to so we stuck it out.
[Warner, a ten month old lab, was the last dog to be taken out today. I'd like to thank him for being so patient while we took 105 other dogs out before him. But something tells me, that even with the wait and the cold dark rain, he was pretty thankful as well.]
At 4:45 I got the last dog out, and soon after was thankful to get in my minivan and crank the heat. Driving home wet and tired after walking homeless dogs in the rain for six hours, the thought of people sitting in warm houses and eating lots of good food made me a little jealous. My turkey potpie wasn't sounding so good anymore and the idea of dropping in unexpectedly at Ari and Greg's crossed my mind, but I smelled and felt like a dirty wet dog, so I figured I just stick to my original plan.
Don't worry; I don't plan on this blog becoming a dog blog. I have always found it pretty annoying when people get a little too excited about talking about their pets, and it is not my intention to bore you with how funny Roscoe the old pit-bull is, or how adorable Piper the black lab is. But I have become fascinated with observing these dogs' behavior patterns; how they interact with each other and with us- the mysterious people that just show up and take them for walks and clean up after them. There is almost always a great deal of tension amongst the dogs in the kennel, especially today when there aren't too many people around to pay attention to them. They bark and howl and jump around their cages when you walk in the room in what seems to be a competitive fit to try to get your attention ahead of all the other dogs. Dogs are pack animals and they are used to living together, but not with walls and cages separating them. The dogs with alpha male tendencies seem to have the most stress, not being able to figure out who really is the alpha and therefore always being on a heightened sense of alert. There is a giant red Chow that I think would be the Alpha of the entire kennel right now, and every time you walk past his cage walking another dog he totally flips out, barking and snarling and looking like he might tear through the kennel door. But when you get him outside he becomes super sweet and is totally nice to other dogs he encounters while being walked. It's just like they need that brief moment of "hey, who's boss, oh yeah, I'm boss, let me sniff your crotch, okay see you later" and once they have that figured out they are totally cool. There is probably a couple other big dogs with strong alpha tendencies that I wouldn't want this chow to come into contact with, but for all the others who immediately sense his manly man ways they are quick to accept him as the dominant one and are chill with it. The dogs don't really seem to care who is in charge, just as long as they are clear on where the stand in the pecking order. But I think the close proximity but constant separation makes that very difficult. Each one is the alpha when they are alone in their kennel barking loudly, or potentially at the bottom of the ladder, they just don't know and I think it worries them.
Okay, I am going to take a shower and stop pretending to be an animal psychologist.
live blogging thanksgiving pt 1
10 am
I have a long-standing tradition of getting a turkey pot-pie and a bottle of whisky and spending thanksgiving by myself. It's not that I am a curmudgeon (well, maybe I am a little bit of one); it's just that I really enjoy the quiet solitude that a holiday spent alone can bring. Roommates vacate, the city streets go quiet, and for one afternoon you can imagine what it might feel like to be the only person on the planet. (Maybe that is why I like the movie The Omega Man so much?)
It's been a few years since I was able to spend Thanksgiving alone, and I must say that this year I am stepping it up a bit. Yesterday I was surprised to find that New Seasons Market doesn't carry the Hungry Man line of TV dinners, so I had to settle for something that is probably much better and healthier. The days of the cheapest possible whiskey are over too. I just turned 34, I gots to grow up sometime...
I remember one great thanksgiving, in 1997 I think, where I had a whole house to myself for an entire weekend. I was in a band back then and we had a basement full of instruments, and I locked myself down there for days with my four-track and recorded hours of crazy music. (in fact, a bit of UrHo trivia, I think I was rocking out on either Adam Forkner's or AC Dickson's drum set). And then a couple years later I made my short film Sincerely, Joe P. Bear over thanksgiving weekend (oh the joys of depression during the holiday season). So who knows, maybe this year things will be equally productive and engaging. And if worse comes to worse I can just stumble down the film center to watch the Bella Tarr movies.
the view from here, right now.
But first things first; being that today is a holiday and that most people have family gatherings to go to and mounds of food to digest, most the volunteers at the Humane Society are taking the day off. It's one thing to quietly ignore your friends turkey dinner invitations, but the idea of sitting around all day drinking whisky while a bunch of dogs sit in their kennels holding their bladders in hopes that somebody will show up to take them outside is totally unacceptable, so I signed up for double duty of dog walking today. I figure that I can bitch and moan all day about my life, but that I really have a lot to be thankful for, not to mention that it is much more fun to bitch and moan after you have done your good deed for the day.
leisure time
somebody pinch me
did i really see on the tv set last night that rick santorum got whipped in the election? did i really wake up this morning to read on the internet that donald rumsfeld resigned? at this rate i suspect that a truck load of florida ballots from the 2000 election will be discovered, and al will be sworn in and gw sent back to texas. maybe the first thing president gore will do is put jimmy carter's solar panels back up at the white house (the ones that ronald reagan dismantled the second he became president).
this must be a dream, so please don't wake me up because i want to keep cozy warm in my red, white, and blue blankets. this whole 'being excited about the results of an election' is a new thing for me.
i'm in love!!!!!
Yes, it is true, but like so many other aspects of my life, it all seems like a cruel joke or a scene from some bad movie. You see, I have been volunteering at the Oregon Humane Society for the past few months as a dog walker, and, well, I have fallen head over heels for a 7 year old Chow/Huskie mix named Tess. Tess is a calm, sweet dog that has been at OHS since early June, and I can't figure out why nobody wants to adopt her. She is cute as can be, likes to wear bandannas, and spends a lot of time sitting around scratching herself. Every week I show up for my shift reluctantly eager to see her; I feel conflicted because I know I want her to get adopted to a good home, but I am always a bit relieved to find that I get to walk her at least one more time. I would adopt Tess in a heartbeat if I had any faith that I'd be a good dog owner, but I know with my lifestyle and profession that I just couldn't maintain a responsible level of ownership. I travel way too much, don't have a yard, and have a hard enough time keeping myself properly fed and groomed. I'd be a terrible dog owner. It's an impossible love.
The thing is that people don't seem to want to adopt the older, bigger dogs. Older, small dogs get swooped up pretty quickly, and puppies go almost instantaneously. Today there was a mob of people who showed up right as the shelter opened because they heard the rumor that a litter of Labradoodles had just come in. The puppies weren't even ready to be put up for adoption, but the public was already waiting. I tried showing off the lovely and well behaved Tess, but nobody seemed interested.
(here is Tess wearing her flashy pink bandanna)
I love volunteering as a dog walker. I go in once a week for about 3 hours and walk as many dogs as I can. Other volunteers are usually there as well, and we try to make sure all of the dogs get out for a walk at least twice a day. Many of the dogs are housebroken, so the poor things will hold it until someone comes along to take them outside. At first it is pure insanity; the dog wants to get out so badly it can barely contain itself, and all the other dogs in the kennel start barking and going bonkers because they want to be let out too. But once you get the dog out of the kennel and onto the grass so it can do its thing, it usually calms down and is just incredibly happy to be outside. You take the dog for a couple laps around the walking path behind the shelter, or maybe bring it to a pin and play ball with it, then you take it back to the kennel and switch it out for another one. There are often more than 80 dogs at the shelter, so rotating them out for walks is a never-ending process.
Most of the dogs at the shelter are bigger dogs between the ages of 6 months and 2 years. My guess is that people buy these dogs as puppies, when they are cute and docile, but when they become older, bigger, and more energetic the owners realize the dog is too much to handle and they bring it to the humane society to put up for adoption. There are also a number of strays and dogs that have been transferred from animal control, some that have been abused and neglected, and some that were just out-right abandoned. The Oregon Humane Society is definitely top notch, but even the best of shelters is still a pretty miserable place for a dog to live. These dogs have no idea what is happening; it's like the worlds and homes that they knew just disappeared and were replaced by this terrible reality of being locked up in a kennel all day in an environment of overwhelming sights, sounds, and smells. The dogs get really stressed out, and then stress each other out. Sometimes they all start barking at once, creating an ear shattering cacophony of sound, and creating a sort of collective freak-out that makes even the calmest dogs start to panic.
What is amazing, though, is that each dog retains pieces of it's past life, and evidence of its personality show regardless of the situation. Each dog is a complete mystery; with a secret history that we can only tap by analyzing it's reactions. For instance, there is one that I have walked a few times that gets really excited every time it sees a silver car and pulls towards it expecting to jump in and go for a ride. Another one gets very excited when it sees blonde women, and another one that gets really freaked out around kids. There is a beautiful and gigantic Akita named Yumi that I have walked a couple times in the past, but today when I entered her kennel to leash her up, she started shaking and cowering in fear. It was raining outside so I had my hat and jacket on, but I also remembered that I have a new mustache that I didn't have the last time I walked her, leading me to believe she was mistaking me for someone else, for some mustached man in her past that had been bad to her.
So, to my friends here in Portland with big back yards and a hankering to be a dog owner, please consider adopting Tess or any of the other great dogs at OHS. I'd be so happy if someone I knew adapted my new found love; it would be very easy to convince me to come over and take her for walks every now and then. Please allow this love to live!!!
(here she is a few weeks ago wearing her traditional red cowboy bandanna)
airplane photo set
last week while traveling with my dad i was able to check out the air-plane boneyard/museum at davis-monthan airforce base in tucson, arizona. my grandfather was stationed at this base in the 1950s, and today it is home to thousands of decomissioned and storaged airplanes. please check out this set on my photo-blog. the crisp light and blue sky of the south west desert is a dream to shoot in. there are 40 some picts in the set, but here are a couple of my favorites...
