Jasper Johns Is A Wow! Man

WOW!  The forceful art of the intense Jasper Johns is so dynamic. Contemplate the man's work and a soul will be transported into a more defined sense of grand creativity.  That's what we need in our oddball culture.

'The Hunger Games' Is Innovative

REALLY POWERFUL:  Let's say this...'The Hunger Games' is a very feisty film. It is the kind of movie that makes you forget the miasma of inarticulate crud one might be dealing with. Indeed J. Lawrence and friends do shrewd work in this giant, money-making movie.

Let's Hope

HOPE that tomorrow is an improvement. I think today is a sour kind of deal that us old codgers don't like. It has been this kind of a situation: Etc. and Etc.  Let's view Turner Classic tonight....maybe feel better.

Bill Evans Produces Kind of Nice Work

BILL EVANS brand of jazz piano is a little happiness. Today has been gross...so a lift was needed. Any help would have been good, but Bill Evans keyboard work was a good recipe for this disgusting day.  I sort of liked Evans work on the vintage number...'Someday My Prince Will Come.'  Imagine many women kind of like that energetic song. Jazz helps heal us, sometimes.

Fine Lunch Comin' Soon!

GOLDEN CORRALL is so good!

I plan to eat lunch at a fave place today...Golden Corrall in historic Gwinnett County, Ga. It is marvelous to have all those vegetables and fish and shrimp/ what a blessing the little things in life are!

Gas Prices....What a Horror!

PAINFUL.....That's what is goin' right now in our absurd Americana culture.

It is hard to believe how DISGUSTING our gas prices are going.  And our big fellas are doing nada...we are just being dragged more and more into the yech slime that is our current economic absurdity.

PLEASE HELP US!  Put relief into all our sickened lives!

Oscar Peterson: Grand Jazz Indeed!

OSCAR PETERSON  is a man who made my day a bit better just now. I dug listening to the shrewd piano man playing a feisty tune called 'Mirage.'  And it was great.  I feel this individual Oscar Peterson has a grandiloquent, pizazz kind of jazz concept that is just right for the bizarre and silly curmudgeon known as me.

The Unkind Are So Odd, Thoughtless

I AM TIRED of the mean, unkind people. They foul up our odd culture even more. You try to communicate with them...and they do not even respond. Why is this bizarre stuff happening more and more?  Why can't we have a little fun and joy and some good responses in our torpid lives?

Casino Stories Are Interesting and Odd

'THE COOLER' is a sleek movie that paints a portrait of the wild world of modern Vegas. I find this film clever and forceful especially because of the carefully constructed acting performances of William H. Macy, Alec Baldwin and Maria Bello. Finesse well accomplished is also the essence of this wry story line that molds this film together.

VEGAS FASCINATES with its brash modern cacophony of unusual sights and sounds and achingly passionate beings.  The soul of contemporary art is resonant with encapsulating modernism and that is what resonates so beautifully in the big casino arena that is the world stage shown in the scintillating film known as 'The Cooler.'

Social Thinking Modes

WHY is it so hard for some souls to communicate with those of us who are somewhat intense? So much of our current culture is odd. In many ways one wonders if all this absurd, stand-offish machoism is just left over absurd reasoning that spilled over from a slothful river of frenetic dumbed-down education.

INDEED it would be good if some individuals would set aside their crass, infantile fears and truly communicate with everyone.....not just a select few.

Sidney Lumet Movies: Real Film Powerhouses

SIDNEY LUMET is one of my very favorite film directors. His style incorporated so much amazingly intense passion that  it really seemed to engulf the moviegoer. A special favorite Sidney Lumet movie of mine is the uncanny, wild one...the saga called 'Serpico.' This thing had harsh, very provocative power.

ANOTHER GREAT ONE was the terrific intense film, 'The Pawnbroker.' It was heavily laden with all sorts of bizarre, yet so meaningful emotional vignettes. It was an overall film delight.  The art of Sidney Lumet remains so vigorously marvelous.

Louise Nevelson: Vibrant So Artful Soul

UNIQUE AND IMAGINATIVE are the two words that sum up the artistic, profound joy that is the creative work of the famed sculptor, Louise Nevelson.  I know that when one surveys the vigorous energy that seems beautifully encapsulated in the work of Louise Nevelson then one is overwhelmed.

ENERGETICALLY INSPIRED by the exciting found objects works of Marcel Duchamp, Louise Nevelson managed to produce unusual sculptural art concepts from the array of bizarre things she discovered. Vivid esthetic artfulness is a wondrous thing to contemplate.  And Nevelson had so many truly fine artistic joys that she conjured up for us all to enjoy.

Buble Produces Fine Vocals, Indeed

MICHAEL BUBLE is a fascinating singer.  It is refreshing to hear his performances because the man understands how to put just the right amount of style on a song.  It is amusing to notice how he can cavort easily from wild, up-tempo tunes to really emotional ballad songs, the kind that really grip a person. Listened to Buble and his fine album 'It's Time' today. Sleek material abounds in this set.

ESPECIALLY LIKED his interpretation of 'Save the Last Dance For Me' and the strong tune entitled, 'Feeling Good.'  The melodious sounds of Mr. Buble made this afternoon a nice one.

Bullying Variables Hard Cross To Bear

From the age of 13 all the way to about 17, I saw so much bullying that it made me sick. Way back then the way to go was to mentally beat up on any person who did not "fit in." I never could comprehend why this tough guy way of thinking was so popular...indeed it was the rage, the most wonderful thing young humans could do. Also, if you were not that into sports then you were ostracized and treated like a non-human.  The problem never seemed to go away and the mental anguish just kept lingering and lingering. I do not know why in our culture we feel it is a grand idea to squelch any being who wants to be a free thinker and just not run with the rest of the pack. If a person enjoys classical music or jazz or fine dramatists like Tennessee Williams or Arthur Miller or even A. Chekov then that soul is a bad bug that needs to be stomped either mentally or physically. However, I have meditated on my increasingly acidic sarcasm defense mechanism over the years and I realize (now that I am wretchedly old) that I used over and over my picaresque shallow skeptic brittleness and virulent nastiness to get back at all the mental loons that swirled around me seemingly all the time. I think now that the fact that I used all my skeptic word processes and nihilistic mental angst over and over as a young male is in truth an absurd reasoning also (thanks for the "absurd reasoning" paradigm" my thoughtful one A. Camus) and I know now that I am an inane charlatan perhaps one might say a skinny fox running around in the Georgia environs with my horrendously gigantic head and emaciated silly-looking body. Another aspect of my years that really sickens me is the fact of being rejected so many times. My mother kept telling me her loopy mantra of "just be yourself" and all of that common sense conundrum. I was never a smooth-talking really savvy male so I hit the wall socially...it seemed like the rejection idiocy was a constant albatross to bear. To sum up...Why in the world can't we learn how to make better lives for ourselves and somehow find a little joy and happiness in this steadily more complicated and meaningless American society. .

Bird, Diz...Good, Lilting Friday Jazz

Listening today to a duo of super jazz icons...Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie. The sleek, innovative music coming from these two men is so joyous...yea...so powerhouse. I loved hearing again Gillespie and Parker doing truly fine material from a good '47 concert set.  The sounds of Bird and Diz make us jazz enthusiasts really smile.

Southern Family Culture Inspires

My son has two daughters...i.e. i have two granddaughters.  It is a marvelous part of the Southern culture, this thing we call family. Or as some famed writers have said..."our blood."  When you see these people growing and becoming more and more creative it is inspiring.

 As the Book of Proverbs says we need to trust in the Lord with all our heart.  I know family enriches each and everyone of us. We are good people and we enjoy the members of our overall blood line. Southern culture is tremendous.

An Engaging Japanese Story Quartet

THE OTHER NIGHT I saw an odd, engaging Japanese film called 'Kwaidan '(1964).  The movie was a series of four stories with each one possessing a considerable amount of bizarre twists. I believe the little story called 'In a Cup of Tea' was especially unique, for this one is about a man who keeps seeing a weird image looking at him from the lower part of his cup of tea.  The other three stories...'Black Hair,' 'The Woman in the Snow' and 'Hoichi the Earless' ...are also full of remarkable, emotional twists that will make even the most whimsical mind delighted.

CRAFTY, ODD EFFECTS abound  in this jazzy, film conumdrum. It's rather amusing and grande guignol  in the fact that the clever ghosts seem to be pulling the very life out of the characters. I think the intense emotionalism in 'Kwaidan' really works well and the overall effect is powerhouse kind of like the visceral clout prevalent in rather contemporary Japanese cinematic works like 'Yojimbo' By Kurosawa.