Sometimes I feel like I am AT WAR with the rest of the world. Like opinions are too strong and I just can't keep them inside but they irk people and I pay for it.
Currently angry at:
-This lady who's sole mission in life seems to be to tell people about all the sexism in the world of comics. She interviewed me once and I felt like she was trying to twist my words, trying to make me say things that would support her already formed conclusions. This same lady is now collaborating with many young girl cartoonists making them do comics filled with her statistics about gender discrimination in the "business". Although I agree there is lots of sexism out there, I feel like all she is doing is discouraging enormously talented young artists from trying to break into a market that's already biased. I saw a comic strip based on the interview she did with me and all my words were taken out of context. Plus, the comic started like this "I first saw JOEY's comics when I seventeen and I was floored. She is the wife of my favorite musician, FUDGEE.". How's that for feminism? I am so mad at it, I can't let it go!
-The ugly as fuck booby sasquatches and gnomes sprouting all over town. One mural artists who bases his work on historical characters is classy. Another mural artist putting its stuff right next to it is a free-for-all. I'd even say it's embarrassing. Who let this happen?
-The inevitable fact that some of your townspeople will give you tude if you organize something, even if you try to dissociate yourself from all previous expectations. "Can Turd Banjo play your festival? They are not that good, but after everything they've done for music in this town!" "No, Turd banjo can't play, sorry." "Fine, I was only trying to help, but since I wasn't invited to help you in the first place, I get it, I'll stop."*
Do I win? Did I rant the most?
Did I rant too much?
Thank you.
*That was a fictionalized combination of various complaints experienced in the past three weeks or so.
I remember the first time I went up to Cranberry Lake, I forgot my shoes, and like, Turd Banjo was like, that's cool man, I've got these Crocs that I keep under the back seat for emergencies, just like this. And then he sang that Rock Around the Croc song, it was like the first time I ever heard it, and it was so golden. But that's cool. I understand you guys had to take the whole festival another direction, for like pragmatic reasons or whatever. It's not like the new crowd is there for Turd Banjo or anything. I mean, it won't really even matter, except to a few, you know, people who, you know, whatever....
I went in to the Museum of Contemporary Craft... just wanted to pop in and see if there was anything worth seeing. I had barely stepped in off the street and explained to the front desk person that I was deciding whether to see the show, when they were like "is that a back pack you're wearing?" Maybe ask that after I pull out my wallet next time, cuz I was like see ya brat.
Loose Thread: That's a lot like when you walk into a store and the person asks you "May I help you?" as your foot barely hits the ground. Turning around and leaving can be incredibly freeing in those circumstances.
kdawg: There are rumors of some sort of "mural war" going on, but I have only heard it from second hand sources. It's gossip. The essence of it is that there is this lady in town who got pissed off at the fact that the only murals we had were done by Bill Mitchell. She is friends with a lot of hippies we know. So anyway, she made a sasquatch mural for Adrift first, but the owners of the building took it down. Something about not wanting to interfere with Bill Mitchell's project. I suspect that maybe they were also trying to be polite, because the mural was of a female sasquatch with sagging boobs. Then Juicy Dogs, Watermark (a sasquatch with glasses! Get it? READING!) and Johnny Picasso all got sasquatch and gnome murals that are the same size as and are screwed in right next to Bill Mitchell's historical work. It's super frustrating, I've gotten in fights with people about it. Some people are like "Why should Bill Mitchell be the only one who gets to have murals in this town?" and I am like "Because he is our town's historian! Because his murals are based on real people and the families like it! For the sake of continuity!". And, even if I hate this person's work, why does she have to do murals specifically? I feel like it is an uphill battle for her if she is using the exact same materials as this other well-liked and established dude. If her thing was to make sasquatch footprints in the sidewalk or small gnome sculptures everywhere people wouldn't mind as much, but now when you look at a wall and it has a family surrounding a car from the thirties, a giant gnome, and a sasquatch all hanging out together. This problem is like a municipal version of that thing that happened when the D.O.S. closed down and we were all called elitists and the new place had an art show where EVERYONE was invited to bring work. It's that thing where you're like "Does anyone really like an art show where no one is turned down and there is work from floor to ceiling?" and you realize that what they like is not what it LOOKS like, but the fact that their stuff is finally on the wall. I joke that this lady is my nemesis even though I know very little about her. She has been posting pictures of What the Heck on her Flickr. She came to the Urine show and wrote "This girl's art was cool, her music wasn't." and then last year took a bunch of pictures of our friend from San Francisco walking around town. Her captions say "Crazy Japanese kid from FRUITS!" (our friend is Vietnamese). Then there was a picture of two guys walking around in shorts and a t-shirt and the caption was "HIPSTERS!".
The thing is that it's even taboo not to like her stuff and talk about it. Almost all of our friends think her stuff is great.
Many of the art lovers in this town can be open-minded to a fault. A lot of my friends just think it's cool to be "creative". Hence the rant about Turd Banjo. Fudge and I don't like Turd Banjo, but for a large portion of our friends, neighbours, and relatives we should just be supportive of the fact that Turd Banjo even plays music in the first place.
In a small community like this one, the more hands you have on a project, the happiest people feel. A friend of mine published a book and I made a window display for it at our local bookstore. The next morning when I came to take a picture, one of the workers at the store had re-arranged my stuff and added her own special touch. The fact that I got upset about it made me look like I was fussy as fuck.
This is the reality of living in a small town. Sometimes you are just on your own wavelength and other people who you like and like you back don't get why you are such a snob. The bar for quality in anything is much lower here. That is why it's sort of a miracle to have a record store like the Business, or a bookstore like Watermark.
And I am very fond of Bill Mitchell. I always felt like it made the town cool to have these really well-made murals all over the place for visitors to seek out. I would also like to point out that Bill Mitchell happens to be quadriplegic, which makes the concept of "going to war" against him even lamer.
Also it seems poor form to jump on board the mural format, since people are already used to looking at those murals. It is like stealing the stage to take eyes from a built-in audience. So it is actually antisocial.
Unrelated rant: The other day I went to my cousin's house for her son's 13th birthday. The old guy from across the street was there, and I've known him for as long as I've lived in Portland, so I've seen him grow dimmer and even more set in his ways.
However, this time he really pissed me off. He asked me, "Did you put your wife to work yet?" and she was sitting right next to me!!! Like, beyond the incredible inappropriateness of that question, it's only worse when you're acting like she can't even speak for herself!
I mean, I know it's because he probably hardly even has a clue of where he is. He definitely seems like he is sliding deeper into dementia, but it still really made me angry, and you can imagine how it made her feel.
Well, her stuff is painted on wood, then screwed into the walls.
And to answer your question, yes. As the daughter or a heritage house painter I can tell you that if there is oil, the paint won't stick. Sometimes on wooden houses there is still some sort of oily sap in the wood that makes bubbles in the paint. You have to scrape the paint off, then make the sap/oil come out of the wood with a heat gun (keeping enough of a distance not to burn the wood). Then prime your wood again and then add your two layers of paint to the building. Be sure to use outdoor paint.
Matthew:
Yeah, but look at you, you are all fancy and New York now. (I mean this in the kind "I miss you guys way".)
MZ: I think with oldsters, you are allowed to give em hell back. Maybe he even wanted to make you mad by denigrating your manfulness. I mean everyone knows that a man has to keep his woman in check. If you give him hell, it will remind him of his youthful days, and the next time you go there he will perhaps ease up on the hazing.
Loose Thread: No way, any attack on her murals would give them more importance. Plus, even if I don't like her stuff, she did work on those things and vandalizing her work would be off target and mean. It felt nice to vent about it with people who feel similarly, but honestly, nothing can be done for now. I have some ideas, which mostly involve emphasizing how important Bill Mitchell's work is. Maybe along the way a call for preservation will be heard and things will go back to being more reasonable.
My reaction was uncomfortable laughter and saying that it's up to her, not me, then listing off a bunch of the things she does. It's tough to figure out how much you can be mean and where you would be crossing the line into "beating up on a mentally disabled person."
The good news is that he will most definitely say it to me again the next time he sees me, because he has obviously added it to his repertoire of questions he asks me every time he sees me. I heard him ask the same question of another guy there. So I will be able to perfect my answer.
You should be like yeah she's going to be your new caretaker, I hope you like wearing diapers.
Yes, I realize I have been often insulting people by comparing them to babies.
Personally I have found that people who are not completely in ideal health get frustrated at always being treated like children. So they in turn frustrate those around them, hoping to remind everyone that they are a powerful adult.
i am too paranoid to truly rant here, but there was a moment when i took this place over that i had to call a lot of people (Lady S included) and say, "get your art out of my store ASAP".
post ironic big foot art is PLAYED the fuck out. last good bigfoot thing was the long lost in the international mail to china/japan classic mystery little wings album that steve made on CD-r in like what? 2003? lost at sea... total vaporware http://www.discogs.com/Little-Wings-Bigfoot/release/2879323 rest in peace. please dont make more bigfoot art, people.
Too much big foot art/bad art is a good rant to have.
It just came full circle for me, the bigfoot lady rant basically comes down to the pressure I am bound to feel about supporting all these different aspects of my community while living in this small town. I am not really into stuff and I just use/exploit this place for my own benefit.
Now my rant is that I have an internet problem and that I should get off the computer and go make my own shitty art.*
*I kid. I don't think my stuff is shitty. But I am sure it is to somebody out there.
Why are so many crucial businesses only open between the hours of nine and five, the exact hours that I work????
Sure, there are weekends, but a lot of places are closed part of the weekend also. THIS REALLY CRAMPS MY STYLE. WHY CAN'T WE BE COOL LIKE COUNTRIES WHERE SHIT STAYS OPEN LATE?????
@YoursTruly retrospectively it was crazy awesome. in the moment, i felt like a bully. i had to track people down and give them a deadline they had to pick their "art" up by or it would end up in the trash. lots of people flaked. lots of "art" went in the trash. i didn't really feel bad about it, it's my store, but it's apparently very contrary to the "vibe" of this town to not be like "yeah, sure i'll display/attempt to sell your collages made of pop tabs". @the_owls i recently shortened my store's hours. even though i like the idea of a record store, or any store, being open late, people who work there need to have lives too (obviously this is only true with smaller stores who don't have elaborate staffs of part-time workers)! TO COMPENSATE i now allow "appointments". i'll come in whenever you want to give me money. no problem.
I have a rant: Why does Comcast/Xfinity try to be an entertainment company? Why are they always trying to sell me TV/land line services? Why can't there just be a fast dumb web pipe that gives you good internet for a reasonable price? I DON'T EVEN OWN A TV TO WATCH YOUR STUPID SHOWS ON, YOU STUPID COMPANY. I JUST WANT FAST INTERNET.
I want to be a punk and abuse the dickens out of the audience. I already get mad that they are staring at me, and now I will curse them for taking the bread away. If anyone is paying attention, they will get annoyed and be like I don't have to stand for this. But most people will not be paying attention and they might think it's funny, and so maybe I will get invited back to play. Then I will get to take out my pains onto the audience in a ritualistic manner. If they don't like it, they can go to hell, and if they like it, they can just take more abuse. That is how I plan to get paid out
few things are more depressing than when fb tells you today is the birthday of someone who killed themselves six months ago. The chipper "send them a message" really drives it home.
LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO SUFFER BAD LADY BIGFOOT ART. ALSO QR CODES - STOP TRYING TO MAKE THOSE HAPPEN DIGIDUDES
Comments
Really?
May I?
Sometimes I feel like I am
AT WAR
with the rest of the world.
Like opinions are too strong and I just can't keep them inside
but they irk people and I pay for it.
Currently angry at:
-This lady who's sole mission in life seems to be to tell people about all the sexism in the world of comics. She interviewed me once and I felt like she was trying to twist my words, trying to make me say things that would support her already formed conclusions. This same lady is now collaborating with many young girl cartoonists making them do comics filled with her statistics about gender discrimination in the "business". Although I agree there is lots of sexism out there, I feel like all she is doing is discouraging enormously talented young artists from trying to break into a market that's already biased.
I saw a comic strip based on the interview she did with me and all my words were taken out of context. Plus, the comic started like this "I first saw JOEY's comics when I seventeen and I was floored. She is the wife of my favorite musician, FUDGEE.". How's that for feminism? I am so mad at it, I can't let it go!
-The ugly as fuck booby sasquatches and gnomes sprouting all over town. One mural artists who bases his work on historical characters is classy. Another mural artist putting its stuff right next to it is a free-for-all. I'd even say it's embarrassing. Who let this happen?
-The inevitable fact that some of your townspeople will give you tude if you organize something, even if you try to dissociate yourself from all previous expectations. "Can Turd Banjo play your festival? They are not that good, but after everything they've done for music in this town!" "No, Turd banjo can't play, sorry." "Fine, I was only trying to help, but since I wasn't invited to help you in the first place, I get it, I'll stop."*
Do I win?
Did I rant the most?
Did I rant too much?
Thank you.
*That was a fictionalized combination of various complaints experienced in the past three weeks or so.
edit: also, commiseration. "Dude how could you not have any TB in your store?" "Because this is my store and that's not my store's thing."
Seems like it just won't be the same without them, good old Turd Banjo
I TOLD YOU!
TURD BANJO WILL NOT BE PLAYING!!!!
OK???!
Don't sweat it. It'll work out... eventually.
That's a lot like when you walk into a store and the person asks you "May I help you?" as your foot barely hits the ground. Turning around and leaving can be incredibly freeing in those circumstances.
kdawg:
There are rumors of some sort of "mural war" going on, but I have only heard it from second hand sources. It's gossip. The essence of it is that there is this lady in town who got pissed off at the fact that the only murals we had were done by Bill Mitchell. She is friends with a lot of hippies we know. So anyway, she made a sasquatch mural for Adrift first, but the owners of the building took it down. Something about not wanting to interfere with Bill Mitchell's project. I suspect that maybe they were also trying to be polite, because the mural was of a female sasquatch with sagging boobs.
Then Juicy Dogs, Watermark (a sasquatch with glasses! Get it? READING!) and Johnny Picasso all got sasquatch and gnome murals that are the same size as and are screwed in right next to Bill Mitchell's historical work.
It's super frustrating, I've gotten in fights with people about it. Some people are like "Why should Bill Mitchell be the only one who gets to have murals in this town?" and I am like "Because he is our town's historian! Because his murals are based on real people and the families like it! For the sake of continuity!". And, even if I hate this person's work, why does she have to do murals specifically? I feel like it is an uphill battle for her if she is using the exact same materials as this other well-liked and established dude. If her thing was to make sasquatch footprints in the sidewalk or small gnome sculptures everywhere people wouldn't mind as much, but now when you look at a wall and it has a family surrounding a car from the thirties, a giant gnome, and a sasquatch all hanging out together.
This problem is like a municipal version of that thing that happened when the D.O.S. closed down and we were all called elitists and the new place had an art show where EVERYONE was invited to bring work. It's that thing where you're like "Does anyone really like an art show where no one is turned down and there is work from floor to ceiling?" and you realize that what they like is not what it LOOKS like, but the fact that their stuff is finally on the wall.
I joke that this lady is my nemesis even though I know very little about her. She has been posting pictures of What the Heck on her Flickr. She came to the Urine show and wrote "This girl's art was cool, her music wasn't." and then last year took a bunch of pictures of our friend from San Francisco walking around town. Her captions say "Crazy Japanese kid from FRUITS!" (our friend is Vietnamese). Then there was a picture of two guys walking around in shorts and a t-shirt and the caption was "HIPSTERS!".
Many of the art lovers in this town can be open-minded to a fault. A lot of my friends just think it's cool to be "creative". Hence the rant about Turd Banjo. Fudge and I don't like Turd Banjo, but for a large portion of our friends, neighbours, and relatives we should just be supportive of the fact that Turd Banjo even plays music in the first place.
In a small community like this one, the more hands you have on a project, the happiest people feel. A friend of mine published a book and I made a window display for it at our local bookstore. The next morning when I came to take a picture, one of the workers at the store had re-arranged my stuff and added her own special touch. The fact that I got upset about it made me look like I was fussy as fuck.
This is the reality of living in a small town. Sometimes you are just on your own wavelength and other people who you like and like you back don't get why you are such a snob. The bar for quality in anything is much lower here. That is why it's sort of a miracle to have a record store like the Business, or a bookstore like Watermark.
And I am very fond of Bill Mitchell. I always felt like it made the town cool to have these really well-made murals all over the place for visitors to seek out. I would also like to point out that Bill Mitchell happens to be quadriplegic, which makes the concept of "going to war" against him even lamer.
If buildings were covered in oil, such as vegetable oil, perhaps it would repel paint or make it easy to remove.
However, this time he really pissed me off. He asked me, "Did you put your wife to work yet?" and she was sitting right next to me!!! Like, beyond the incredible inappropriateness of that question, it's only worse when you're acting like she can't even speak for herself!
I mean, I know it's because he probably hardly even has a clue of where he is. He definitely seems like he is sliding deeper into dementia, but it still really made me angry, and you can imagine how it made her feel.
Well, her stuff is painted on wood, then screwed into the walls.
And to answer your question, yes. As the daughter or a heritage house painter I can tell you that if there is oil, the paint won't stick. Sometimes on wooden houses there is still some sort of oily sap in the wood that makes bubbles in the paint. You have to scrape the paint off, then make the sap/oil come out of the wood with a heat gun (keeping enough of a distance not to burn the wood). Then prime your wood again and then add your two layers of paint to the building. Be sure to use outdoor paint.
Matthew:
Yeah, but look at you, you are all fancy and New York now.
(I mean this in the kind "I miss you guys way".)
What if you sticker/wheatpaste-bombed them with nursing babies (to scale).
It sort of highlights their lowbrow tastelessness without having to say anything political about bare bosoms.
No way, any attack on her murals would give them more importance.
Plus, even if I don't like her stuff, she did work on those things and vandalizing her work would be off target and mean.
It felt nice to vent about it with people who feel similarly, but honestly, nothing can be done for now.
I have some ideas, which mostly involve emphasizing how important Bill Mitchell's work is. Maybe along the way a call for preservation will be heard and things will go back to being more reasonable.
The good news is that he will most definitely say it to me again the next time he sees me, because he has obviously added it to his repertoire of questions he asks me every time he sees me. I heard him ask the same question of another guy there. So I will be able to perfect my answer.
Yes, I realize I have been often insulting people by comparing them to babies.
Personally I have found that people who are not completely in ideal health get frustrated at always being treated like children. So they in turn frustrate those around them, hoping to remind everyone that they are a powerful adult.
Subj: And this is why I will never join The Cult
Body: http://goo.gl/3j0rH
What a bummer, don't impose your limp, lazy humor and terrible painting technique on an entire community!
Perhaps this person truly has a personality disorder that allows them to think this is desirable behavior?
rest in peace. please dont make more bigfoot art, people.
Believing Is Believing, Produced by Full Life, 2008
It just came full circle for me, the bigfoot lady rant basically comes down to the pressure I am bound to feel about supporting all these different aspects of my community while living in this small town. I am not really into stuff and I just use/exploit this place for my own benefit.
Now my rant is that I have an internet problem and that I should get off the computer and go make my own shitty art.*
*I kid. I don't think my stuff is shitty. But I am sure it is to somebody out there.
what a crazy/awesome thing to have to do!!!!! How did you even go about it?
Why are so many crucial businesses only open between the hours of nine and five, the exact hours that I work????
Sure, there are weekends, but a lot of places are closed part of the weekend also. THIS REALLY CRAMPS MY STYLE.
WHY CAN'T WE BE COOL LIKE COUNTRIES WHERE SHIT STAYS OPEN LATE?????
Not being able to buy all liquors in the grocery store bugs me.
retrospectively it was crazy awesome. in the moment, i felt like a bully. i had to track people down and give them a deadline they had to pick their "art" up by or it would end up in the trash. lots of people flaked. lots of "art" went in the trash. i didn't really feel bad about it, it's my store, but it's apparently very contrary to the "vibe" of this town to not be like "yeah, sure i'll display/attempt to sell your collages made of pop tabs".
@the_owls
i recently shortened my store's hours. even though i like the idea of a record store, or any store, being open late, people who work there need to have lives too (obviously this is only true with smaller stores who don't have elaborate staffs of part-time workers)! TO COMPENSATE i now allow "appointments". i'll come in whenever you want to give me money. no problem.
Why does Comcast/Xfinity try to be an entertainment company? Why are they always trying to sell me TV/land line services? Why can't there just be a fast dumb web pipe that gives you good internet for a reasonable price? I DON'T EVEN OWN A TV TO WATCH YOUR STUPID SHOWS ON, YOU STUPID COMPANY. I JUST WANT FAST INTERNET.
http://www.digitalmusicnews.com/permalink/2012/120619lowery
or
http://thetrichordist.wordpress.com/2012/06/18/letter-to-emily-white-at-npr-all-songs-considered/
few things are more depressing than when fb tells you today is the birthday of someone who killed themselves six months ago. The chipper "send them a message" really drives it home.
LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO SUFFER BAD LADY BIGFOOT ART.
ALSO QR CODES - STOP TRYING TO MAKE THOSE HAPPEN DIGIDUDES