Nobody Is Super

Arnie thinks Super Tuesday is just another day but then Arnie is suffering from terminal cuteness.

Check the trains going by your area for the latest travelers:

I'd like to put all those yapping political nightmares on a train to nowhere permanently.  Yes, all of them.  But others have said it better than I can:

Mark Twain:  There is no distinctly Native American criminal class, save Congress.

Edward Langley (Artist, 1928-1995):  What this country needs are more unemployed politicians.

Aesop:  We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.

The Guys

Recognize us?  It's me and Seth Apter!  The famous Seth of The Altered Page.  We had coffee together last week and we were  happy to see each other because, after all, we are twins that were separated at birth.  Except that I think I have more hair than he does.  Not that there is much of that anyway.

We were in New York City last week, right after the big icy snowstorm and just before the crazy weather this week.  The timing was perfect because there wasn't even any snow on the ground while we were there.

The Guys above were at the Peter Fischli/David Weiss exhibit at the Guggenheim.  This is my opinion about the art in that exhibit:

Just because a cat has kittens 

in the oven 

 doesn't make them biscuits

We also went to the MOMA and saw this great mask by Joan Miro:

And the MOMA has an exhibit by Marcel Broodthaers.  This is my opinion about the art in that exhibit:

Just because a cat has kittens 

in the oven 

 doesn't make them biscuits

My Blog Wrangler just told me to get over it, there were plenty of other things we saw that were just fine.  And we got to have lunch with another New York friend who has great stuff here. She thinks it's very amusing that one of the highlights of our visit was a First -- seeing a rat in the subway!  He was more frightened of all of the passengers getting off the subway than we were of him.  Most people were checking him out to see if he had pizza. What are we talking about?  Go here to see.

Joyce Pensato

In January we went to Fort Worth to see the Gustave Caillebotte show at the Kimbell Museum.  It was a an interesting show with good notes/signage for each painting.  But it was very crowded and it's hard to see learn about the art when there are clusters of people, all holding up the museum's audio device to their ear, standing numbly in front of the art while they listen to the signage being read to them.

What do you do?  Slide in front of them so you can read the signage? Nope, we've figured out the trick.  Most museums will have a large-print brochure near the entrance of the special exhibit.  The brochure will duplicate the small print signage next to the art and will be set up in the order the art is arranged in the exhibit.  So, take the large print brochure, stand behind the numb-nuts listening to what the art is about, read the brochure and look at the art, without having to shuffle in and out of their frozen clusters. Sometimes the audio will have enhanced features but there is a point when you just have to look at the art and think about it for yourself.

The image above wasn't part of the Caillebotte show but was at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, which is right across the street from the Kimbell.  It's called Texas Batman, by Joyce Pensato.  We'd never hear of her before but she's become more interesting to us because she makes big funky black and white painting and she's 70 years old.  And she has a messy studio (her own image):

Sometimes you find art just a block away, across the street from where you live.

Sad Rabbit

This little rabbit is named "Fear No Beauty" by Kari Rives.  He's sad about the Rabbit Hash General Store that burned down this week.

Yes, we've been to Rabbit Hash, Kentucky, and we've seen the store (but we didn't go in).  How do you get there? You drive south from Cincinnati, Ohio, and pass through Sugartit, Kentucky.  Keep driving until you get to Beaverlick.  It's very famous for having all its signs stolen.  Turn to the west and make a rest stop at Big Bone Lick State Park.  Then back on Beaver Road toward Lower River Road where you'll eventually find Rabbit Hash.

No, I'm not making any of that up.

Going in a different direction (I'm sure you're thankful for that), here is another give-away.

I've used this glaze before and each time it is slightly different.

My Blog Wrangler is busy cursing just one more change in her life -- Picasa Web Albums are going to be closed out.  Every single picture in this blog is from Picasa Web Album on our desktop computer. Will Google find a way to preserve the pictures? Will Google find a way to make it simple for her to post pictures in the future?  We'll see.

Love and All That Stuff

Beats me.  Happy Valentine's Day anyway.

This little Train Child stays right here with us - the Blog Wrangler insists.  So I pretend I made it just for her.

Here's hoping I get lucky for Valentine's Day.  Lucky?  That means a fresh, warm batch of Ghirardelli Double Chocolate (with Chocolate Chips) Premium Brownies.  With icing!

Who's Your Daddy?

Picasso at the MOMA.  He did really little stuff that maybe nobody noticed in the display case. These great heads are only about as big as a quarter.

At our Independent Living Retirement Community (that's marketing-speak for Old Folks' Home) we party a lot.  The proof is right here where yours truly and three other volunteers on the Bartenders Guild helped juice up the residents for our Mardi Gras party. Yessir-ee, Open Bar at all our parties! After all, none of us have to drive home.

Longhorn Red

This is Lester. He's about 3 inches high and is made from Longhorn Red clay.  Sometimes I'm using white clay, sometimes tan clay, sometimes whatever is left by other students.  Oh yeah, I claim those leftovers!  Some people might think I'm just being cheap (well, yes) but let's just consider it "repurposing".

For years and years Susan had this license plate and finally the state of Texas made her give it up for a different one.  After all, we need to have something for our prisoners to do.  Making a mold of the plate and then the plate duplicate with Longhorn Red wasn't my original idea, we saw someone else doing it.  But it was interesting to try.  I'm sure you could do it with polymer clay or with plaster.

So far she hasn't had to give up her car - it's only 16 years old this month.

Netflix gave us 5-star creeps with this great movie, with terrific acting:  The Gift. Another movie where the last 5 minutes change your mind into a totally different direction... maybe.

What's On Your Bulletin Board?

I'm back in school now, much to Susan's delight.  Where has the blog been hiding lately?  I don't even dare ask.  I can say that the computer has been cranky lately, IE has been giving her fits and we've added Chrome to the computer (and I have to have my hand held every time I try to use it).  To top it off we got new iPhones because our old ones were so old Apple wouldn't let us update the operating system. Uber was the tipping point - we couldn't get the app unless we had a more current operating system.  No, we haven't used Uber, we wanted to be prepared just in case.

The operating system trick is Apple's way of making you upgrade. Going from a 3 to a 6 means a LOT of changes and adjustments, even if you backed everything up and restored it to the new one.  And Susan is thoroughly pissed that the 6 doesn't fit easily in her pants pocket.  I once made the mistake of asking her why women don't wear cargo pants and got the mysterious response "Hips! We have hips!"

One of the best movies we've seen lately on Netflix:

The Secrets in Their Eyes

We still aren't sure if we know the exact ending, it really could have verged a different direction.  It also reminds us of another great movie: Closed Circuit.  Be sure to watch the one produced in 2009, by Juan Jose Campanella. The one in 2015, produced by an American is no, no, no, not anywhere close to acceptable.