Dryers

Why is it that I get such satisfaction from washing clothes and not using the dryer? No, I don't like to walk around in wet clothes. I hang my clothes to dry. It's not just the buck and a quarter I am saving that makes me happy. I'll just spend the money elsewhere. As we did tonight on sushi at Drunken Fish in Oakland.

But hanging clothes to dry, such visceral satisfaction. Why pay for something when it can happen for free. Also nice is to see the pile of laundry go down slowly. Is part of the reason the USA uses so much more energy because we do much more laundry? How many times to you wear a shirt before washing it? how about underwear or socks? Why do you or do you use the dryer?

The less you use the dryer the longer your clothes will last. Think about the lint. That is just money in the garbage. You paid for that lint when it was still part of your shirt or whatever before you stuck it in the dryer, so why throw it away?

Dryers and billboards should be banned. Just think about how much nicer cities would look if there were no billboards. Take a moment right now to think about it. No, I mean it really. Take a deep breath look away from the computer and think about a billboard free environment.

Okay, look back now.

Nice wasn't it.

Kinda like Vermont.

Sweater vs. Heater

I was in class today, large dance studio. Kind of a cold day, for the Bay Area, so the studio was cold. Another dancer in class asked if it was possible to turn on the heat. Considering the size of the room and the strength of most heater, by the time the room was warm class would have been over. She had another layer to put on, but that was not her initial thought.

Maybe I am stereotyping here, but I am guessing that a dancer in the Bay Area is a more liberal person informed on current events, global warming and green house gases. A sweater produces less CO2 than a heater, yet the idea of putting on a sweater, came after the thought of turning on the heat.

Reminds me of the time I was at a friends house. We were in the backyard barbequeing burgers, talking about the sustainability of the American lifestyle. As we walked inside, I saw his wife turn on the heat instead of putting on a sweater. Oh the sustainable lifestyle.

As for me, I am going to go back to watching a DVD on my laptop and eat some ice cream.

Yoga Lemon

Yoga studios are a place of endless enjoyment. All the fit healthy people, smiling and blissful. The coordinated LuLuLemon outfits. Saw one lady the other day, all cute in her outfit. She was bending forward and more than peeking out was old granny underwear, blah beige and ragged looking.

Do not judge a book by its cover.

Bows and Relenquising

Why do actors bow after a show? If they just spent the previous 1.5 hours creating a world, with lines and costumes and sets and music and emotions, why is it all dispelled at the end with a bow? Would you right after an amazing meal (god, i hate that word) take a swig of mouthwash? Having De Ja vu right now. Was this written already or just thought about?

yesterday had half a pot brownie and walked over to the Grand Lake Theater to see Ghost Rider. That movie was tongue in cheek. Either that or a Republican propaganda film. Are there really those fallen angels that represent the element, air, water, and earth? Is that how Christianity dealt with paganism? Take the Tree for X-mas, a bunny for Easter and then cast everything else away?

Word to the Wise

Don't go all in when all you have is a pair of eights.

Mental Stimulation

Just had a class with Shelley Senter. Did some Alexander and then choreography. What I noticed was that my brain is stimulated in a different way than when I do contact. Shelley's movement, similiar to movement I have experienced at the Trisha Brown studios, (Shelley danced for Trisha for 5 years), stimulates my movement brain. After about an hour of that type of choreography I want to dance around in that manner or style, or using that style as a source.

Contact on the other hand, gets me into my conscious thinking brain. After a long session of contact I tend to sit still and just think. The less I think in my contact, the better the dance( in some sense), the more I think later. I really noticed this dutring the workshop I took last week with Martin Keogh. After day two, I was sitting at home reading. Well, actually not reading but sitting on the couch holding a magazine, staring at it, but thinking intensely, about all the sensations I had experienced, the rolls, spirals and pathways. That is where the thinking starts and then off into....

Apply to get produced

Am currently in the midst of putting stuff together to send to various theaters to get produced. Kind of a pain.

Here is my brilliant idea-

Send the DVD with an email address to the theater. They watch it and then email you back.

Why all the letters of intent, resumes, cards?

The work is the work

fuck the details

The Solution to Iraq

So it's like a triangle of violence. The Shias hate the Sunnis. The Sunnis hate the Shias. And both of them hate the Americans. The Americans are there to stop the voilence between the Shia and the Sunni. The sooner they calm down, the sooner the Americans will leave.

So if the Sunnis and the Shia agree to a cease fire till the Americans leave and then wait a little bit after the Americans leave, they can then get back to the business of killing each other without interference by the Americans.

Marfa, Tx

Back here in Marfa with the architects, Rinehart-Herbst. Looking at houses around town. forgot my sunglasses and hat. Not as cold I we thought it would be here but sunnier. Supposed to be overcast the whole time. Then again the forecast here changes every 40 minutes.

Staying at the Thunderbird Hotel. Pretty nice, has an iLife speaker setup or is it called iHome. Either way don't have an iPod. They still don't have a radio. I wish some celebrity would complain that the iPod has no radio. I've written Apple several times, but no response. Definitely think writing about it in my Blog will change things.

Tried setting up a blog with Blogger. Hoping that would be more user friendly. Yahoo! still hasn't responded to my beef with how many steps I have to go through to get to post a blog with their set up. Irritating, no one listens to Andrew. Wonder if Amazon sells that book? or could that sentence be a command?

Wonder if Amazon sells that book.

Well, did you? If I write it and you read it you will think it.

Link my page to your page. Read my blog.

And then on Blogger someone already has the wasswasswass.blogspot.com. Who the hell is it? I know of no other wasswasswass. Maybe it was I, trying a while ago to set it up and forgot the passwords.



Blog blog blog blah blog blog blah blah blah blog blah blah blog blog whine whine blog blah blog blog blah.

Nothin' much...at least that is what Drive Genius is...

Nothing much happened today. Had rehearsal with Mr. Wells and company. Seems like dance groups that say "& dancers" or "&company" do not have a set group of people that they work with all the time. Guess those phrases are a substitute for I make a lot of work but can't pay enough to keep people around for a long time.

Tough in this art form...

After rehearsal, went to the Apple store and bought Drive Genius. More like DRIVE IMBECILE. On my desktop, it crashed when I tried to register it. You'd think companies would try to make it easy to register their software, so you don't limewire it for FREE. And then starting it by holding down "c" took so $@@$#@!! long on my laptop ( even longer on my desktop, I thought it was a bum disk). So my laptop is now optimized and has no bad blocks etc.
Then made it to the jam in Berkeley. a lot of people there. was nice. Danced pretty much non stop when I was there. Nice to listen to the ebb and flow of volume and experience the light fading. I was kind of bummed when people turned the lights on. "Dancing in the dark"
I guess to do a Po Mo dance form well, you have to have a Po Mo view of your body. All parts are places to roll, become shelves, become handles. Well maybe not all but most. Lifting someone by his nuts might not be so good.
The moral of the story...don't get Drive Genius, or at least don't pay for it.

Chapters

mmmm...well for the past I do not know how long I have been trying to finish up several dvds that I have been working on for the past couple years. Get them squared away, the video_ts files on the new drive and then dump all the media, render files, capture scratch etc.

Thought I was done with CUBIC. Then I watched one of them, the first half second of Park2 of one of the shots was bungled. Didn't chop it properly. The beginning, such a minute part. But if you're going to do it, do it correctly, right? Can't wait to have it done with. Like starting a new chapter. or a new book.

Feel as if the ideas within those DVDs (aeiou, Here&Now, IYWSHWSG, etc) though I still love them, are excess baggage in a way. Time to remove them from my consciousness and move on. Sometimes ideas sit in my head for a while, some for too long and then the creation of the physical object is a purging of the idea. Some ideas I do not want to create the thing for them as the idea is too much fun to think about.

Thinking about something is frequently more enjoyable than seeing/hearing/ it. My favorite part of a movie is the time before it starts, the anticipation.

Render, render, render off to render we go....

Berlin

Is just about the coolest city ever! Been here for about 1.5 weeks, getting our apartment together. One thing we don't have is interet access at our place yet, so have to go smoky interet cafes. No need to drive and therefore no need for parking. After I got a hair cut the other day, while walking home got a Chicken Doner and a beer. Can't swing a stick here without hitting Americans. We are §$&"§%"! everywhere, which kinda sucks. Guess I am part of the problem th0ugh. Unless somehow I become part of the solution...cool place except for the smoke...

Scarlett Johansson

is a terrible actress. Just watched "Scoop" last night by Woody Allen. And okay he was not at the top of his game when he wrote that one but Scarlett. Yeow, that was a painful performance to watch. She was acting so hard, giving it everything she had each line. You could almost see her thinking what to do next, how to touch her glasses, how to smirk and shrug her shoulders. She does not appear to be comfortable on camera. She was not enough of a foil for Woody so his performance wasn't as sharp as it could have been. Though he was great when being Splendini, and card tricks at the parties.

Woody, Woody, Woody, we know she gives you a woody, but that doesn't mean she should be in your film. At least then dress her in skimpier stuff. Nice T and A, but her torso is a bit short to really accent them.

This film did not have the pithy questions and lines about life that are throughout his other films. I guess that by know in his advanced years her has the answers now or stopped asking them. "Tell funnier jokes" the alien advises him in Stardust Memories. This one didn't really have them.

Reviews

I was just reading the NY Times book review from this past Sunday. In it the name of the reviewer is given as is the name of the last book the person wrote. If not a book then what publication that person writes for, edits etc. When reading dance reviews, I don't see the authors' names attached to any previous production.

Is there a different standard between the art forms? Are dancers not reviewing each others work? Are dancers not able to review each others work? Would I rather have a dancer review my work than a non dancer? Well, hell, at this point I would want anyone to review my work...

not inspired

yes, many thoughts reside

but not the desire to express them to the degree that they deserve

Saddam's Execution

here is a video of it.

What does it mean that someone used a cellphone to film the execution of a deposed despot? My first question was - is this real? Do I need to see this? People used to watch executions in town squares, no? Now those town squares are online.

What kind of shit storm is awaiting us? Won't Saddam just become a martyr? As Obi-Wan said to Vader- if you kill me, it will only make me stronger (okay, not the exact words, whatever, haven't seen the movie in a while, and last time, I was stoned)

Dreamgirls

we are dream girls we are dream girls we are your wet dream girls

gotta love how songs gloss over the topics that they really are talking about. Sort of taking all the sting, spice, and interest out of the topic to make it palatable for the masses.

That is what happened with the movie"Dreamgirls". It had so many possible great storylines in there, too many for 2 hours to deal with, that nothing really stood out. The story of Eddie Murphy's heroin addict could have been great. The story of Effie's drinking and single mother hood could be really intense and then her comeback. The megalomania of Jamie Foxx's character. The squashing of C.C. soul and spirit to make the songs fit into marketable packages could have been interesting. Curtis' realization of fatherhood could have been interesting.

But in the end none of these issues are really tackled, leaving you with not much.

Also what is with Beyoncé's eyebrows? Looks like there is something missing between her eyebrown? is it expression? How much Botox is in there. And why is she up for best actress? Jennifer Hudson is the main star in the movie, not Beyoncé. Once again the curvy chick gets bumped by the skinny one.

Parking

Yesterday, Kelly and I went for a little hike in the Huckleberry Botanic Preserve up in the Oakland Hills.

As we were leaving, I saw a car drive into the parking area and back into a parking spot. From some reason, I have always been suspicious of people who back into parking spots. It doesn't save any time. Back out now or back out later, same diff. I understand backing into a spot at a campground, so that the trunk is closer to your site. I think people who back into parking spots are too occupied with their cars. Or they have some secret knowledge I do not possess.

Jealousy, it all comes back to jealousy.

Nauman

Just got a link to video by Bruce Nauman.

You just gotta love his stuff. The idea is so simple and contained almost like a color, a new color on everyone's palette. Each time I see a video of his that I have not seen before, it is like a section of the refied world is opened up, allowing me new possiblities. What would/could I do with a video of me pinching my neck? I had never thought about a video of me pinching my neck. Aaack, my mind is opening. And then all his walking videos. Damn, just makes you want to do something and then film it. Bam idea bam

new colors new colors new colors

That is what is important, the new colors. Anyone can paint but can anyone make new colors?

Post show depression

The Scenery was wrecked. Guessing some people were thoroughly confused. Received the usual platitudes "Nice to see you dancing", the euphemism for many things - don't like it, didn't get it, you can't dance. Not that people need to have a well articulated opinion after the show, but something.

The houses were filled, not busting at the seams, but more than my last two shows here. So that is nice. Not sure if that is due to Mary and Nina's names or just knowing more people here in town.

One thing I am learning is that most people are not very curious. And how can you be an artist and not be curious? Yes, everyone had busy lives and many obligations, but one of those obligations as an artist, as a dancer, is to see as much work as possible. To see what is going on, what people are investigating/thinking about. You can only poo-poo someone's work if you have seen it. And my show was only $15.

How else are you going to learn about art if you don't go see show? Dance class isn't much of a place, rehearsal isn't much of one either. Well, those are both good places, but not as good as seeing other people's work.

Maybe I am approaching bitterness, but more and more I am convinced that people are not curious.