JUNE 30, 2009

Here is the new section of The Picture of Everything (so far)!

Seeing stuff like this makes me think "Why bother completing The Picture of Everything when people can do things that are much more awesome?" Yet I continue to move on toward completing the piece. Why give up now when the endgame is in sight?

Lot's of death this month. From the tragic loss of my friend Free's dad David Carradine to a great 6 year old kid named Pablo struck down by cancer. Of course there's also the passing of 2 other cultural icons.

Ah, the internet... brewing with brilliance (NSFW).

Forgot to mention I saw The Room last month and my life was indeed changed by the experience. Not necessarily for the better, but I will be back to see it for my birthday at the end of July.

Finally, my friend Mike and I will be appearing as DJ Fnord and KJ Kollider at the mash-up club Bootie San Francisco on Saturday July 11th. We will be running the world's first Mash Up Karaoke!

MAY 31, 2009

Here is the new section of The Picture of Everything (so far)!

My friend Gyorgy BP Szabo has a piece called "Urban Ray" online where I do spoken word over his music.

This is very funny and made of awesome.

Ever notice how the clouds in the famous "Inverted Jenny" stamp look like a fingerprint?

K-Jams... The greatest thing to happen to the Macintosh in the entire history of karaoke.

APRIL 30, 2009

Here is the new section of The Picture of Everything (so far)!

This month I had an interview with LAUSD, who determined that my Adult Full Time Credential and my Vocational Credential don't count in terms of getting a job teaching K-12. What this means is I have to go back to school to get a single-subject teaching degree in art before I can get a job teaching kids. The last few weeks have been spent applying to Cal State Los Angeles, filling out forms for financial aid, and trying my damndest to find freelance work. Jobs are hard to find, and times is tough. Hope by the time I get a credential in 2 years that things will be much better.

Visited Erich Orser in Las Vegas, who was up there for a writing conference for his incredible book Young And Evil. We got to see Thee Swank Bastards and had some drinks with Szandora LaVey. Also got a few lenticular art pieces up at La Luz De Jesus Gallery in Hollywood, and saw a neat Russ Meyer art tribute in Palm Springs so April wasn't a bad month. Didn't do much for Jesse's birthday, but she didn't want to do anything for it this year to begin with.

"The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman is my favorite book of 2009 so far. Listening to the author read it is better than reading it yourself, IMHO.

MARCH 31, 2009

Updated HIGHLIGHTS section of The Picture of Everything!

The Picture of Everything is coming along, with a possible gallery show for December 2010 when it's done. Keeping my fingers and toes crossed until I can confirm that, but there's still plenty of time...

Meanwhile, it looks like I picked the worst possible time ever to become an art teacher, since (as of 4/09) LAUSD is handing out pink slips and there's a hiring freeze. Hope I can look back on all this as the darkness before the dawn, since things are pretty glum at this time I'm sorry to say. Still, I did do some volunteer work at Westside Leadership Magnet school in Venice, California. The class made their own comic book! Of course, I did all the layout and printing, and gave a kick ass Powerpoint presentation to boot.

My Dr. Strange pal Sanctum asked me to do the "5 things about you" meme on my blog. You can read the rules here, but I'm too lazy to follow them. I'm not a person who ever did chain letters when they were sent out via snail mail, so perhaps that bad luck is now upon me, since I don't pass on memes either. Here's my things about me though...

1. I own a copy of Amazing Fantasy #15, the first ever appearance of Spider-Man. I got it when I was 13 years old for $75.00 from Graphitti Comics in Los Angeles. It was graded a CGC 1.0 and signed by Stan Lee.

2. I have a fetish for closed-toe shoes. Open toed shoes of any kind are a turn-off to me. My wife tells me I should "get over it", but I can't help how I feel. It's not bare feet, but the shoes themselves and how they make the foot look that somehow repulses me. No idea where this comes from, but there you go.

3. I was in the room with Dr. Timothy Leary when he died in 1996, along with around 10 of his close friends and family members. The last words I heard him say weren't the widely reported "Why? Why not?" (which I DID hear him say), but a very quiet "Beautiful... beautiful..." (I told Zac Leary about this, which is why Tim's Wikipedia entry is now making note of it!) I also introduced Dr. Leary to Johnny Rotten at a Psychic TV show. Tim and I were friends, and we worked together on a few books back in the 90's. It was all about computers for him at the time... the web, blogging and cyberspace... much more than it was about the stuff he was famous for in the 60's. Don't think I ever saw him do acid. He did like his nitrous oxide and menthol cigarettes though...

4. I have seen ALL of the following live shows with bands and performers who are now dead: Tupac Shakur, The Grateful Dead, Nirvana, INXS, The Cramps, Wesley Willis, Pink Floyd (Richard Wright), The Mentors, Christian Death, Don Ho, Luther Vandross, The Weather Girls and The Ramones. If I come to see your band: WATCH OUT!

5. My favorite meal would have to be an Apple Pan Hickory Burger and a slice of chocolate creme pie.

I'm going to be selling some comic books in April. Check here for info.

FEBRUARY 28, 2009

Here is the new section of The Picture of Everything (so far)!

February was interesting. The web design job in Glendale fired me for poor work quality. After coming in early and staying late whenever necessary, completing literally dozens of various tasks every day, going over any error and correcting them whenever they were found and dealing with the horrible health care and lack of employee benefits... They have some nerve. It's a shitty time to be unemployed, but this crappy company may have done me a big favor in the long run.

I DID get my teaching credentials and passed the CSET! I'm going to start teaching some art classes as a volunteer at some schools around town to get a bit of experience and then try to land a steady job asap. Anyone out there need a kick ass art/multimedia teacher?

In other news, I'm showing a new lenticular art piece that's not online yet (as of 2/28/09) based on Alan Moore and Dave Gibbon's WATCHMEN series at the "Physical Nostalgia" art show at Meltdown Comics Gallery. The show opens March 7th (the day after the movie!) and runs thru the 22nd. More info HERE.

Neilalien mentioned a cool flickr group of famous women Photoshopped to become robots. Some definite skills at work here, and an interesting fetish.

You know what I could watch all day? Ants in slow motion spinning in midair.

I really have to hand it to everythingisterrible.com. They have really taken the mantle from TV Carnage and merged it onto You Tube for a fantastic dose of things you will not be able to un-see. Bad acting, Insane Infomercials from the 80's, obsolete technology, scary celebrity relaxation videos, and a host of other things make this another site I have to check on a daily basis.

Coraline In 3D is definitely the best movie of the year so far.

Bowie meets MGMT in a great mash up by A Plus D. Also check out Celebrity Murder Party's New Order meets Funkytown meets Car Wash.

Until the end of March... Be well everyone.

JANUARY 31, 2009

This will hopefully be the only month in the course of finishing The Picture of Everything where I DON'T post an update to the work on the last day of the month. I'm right in the middle of a section that I don't want to disassemble to scan just yet. Hope folks understand that. The piece is going well though, and I'm on schedule to finish the work in 2010. It's been getting a lot of press in the blogosphere lately, from Waxing Poetically, Not Yellow Chicken, WTFoodge, Neatorama, Really Good Magazine, Diary of A Restless Mind, and The Fire Wire, just to name a few.

A lot has happened in 2009 already. On a personal level, I'm now busy getting my credential to be a high school art/multimedia teacher. I passed the C-BEST and am waiting for my results on the CSET. My job doing web design in Glendale had me doing lots of mandatory overtime this month, which both sucks since it means less time for art but also means a bit more money coming in. I'm lucky to still have a job in this economy, but still don't like my job. Not many people do I guess... I think getting summers off as a teacher and the infinitely better medical coverage are lights at the end of my employment tunnel right now.

We now have a new president, which I truly believe is a great step for America. Here's some fantastic photos of a truly historic event.

We also lost one of my absolute favorite actors of all time, Patrick McGoohan. If you've never seen The Prisoner, you can watch them all for free online. It's my favorite show of all time. Rest in peace, Number 6... or John Drake... or whatever your real name was on the show...

There's a fantastic blog that features a complete pre-code horror comic story EVERY DAY. The Horrors of It All is one of those amazingly obsessive comic book sites (like my buddy's Doctor Strange site Sanctum Sanctorum Comix!) that is worth visiting as often as possible.

Los Angeles radio station Indie 103.1 may now be off the commercial airwaves, but it's better than ever online... and currently commercial free. Listen on I-Tunes here.

Some amazing stuff on You Tube... THIS will make your eyeballs bleed. THIS will make your head completely explode.

It amazes me that some people have still never heard of LOLcats. It's already evolved to the next level with FAIL Dogs.

If you happen to have a few hundred dollars to burn (yeah right!) and love Great Cthulhu, you can buy a really cool pipe, a kick ass limited edition sculpture or some solid gold cufflinks.

My brother likes to tease me about possible horrible casting choices for Doctor Strange. Nothing he has ever mentioned in jest would be as bad as this.

Still hoping for a weird and beautiful future...

JANUARY 2, 2009

Could this one be the best year ever? At this point all we can do is hope.

Good way to start things off: A comic book for every day of the year from 1 to 365...

Here's my annual awards for 2008:

MUSIC: