Photo by Roman.
Photo by Roman.
Photo by Roman.
Photo by Roman.
Photo by Roman.
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Garbage XIII: the Mylar That Ate Your Birthday
Daffydowndilly
What would Spring be like without that perennial pioneer, the daffodil or narcissus? This is the first that I saw this year. It was the end of March and the blossom amplified the morning sun into a blaze amid the wreckage of yesteryear.
As pretty as it may be, Wikipedia warns:
“While all narcissi are poisonous when eaten, poet’s daffodil is more dangerous than others, acting as a strong emetic and irritant. The scent can be powerful enough to cause headache and vomiting if a large quantity is kept in a closed room.”
This should probably not be taken as a metaphor for poetry unless maybe in grade school. But it may be why it “is considered sacred to both Hades and Persephone, and grows along the banks of the river Styx in the underworld.”
The Wikipedia entry for Narcissus has a fascinating section on its uses in medicine, traditional and modern, and in perfumes.
Morning Cafe
The Door Into Summer?
“The Door Into Summer” was the title of Robert Heinlein’s 1957 sci-fi novel but I thought the title was also appropriate for this very surfy door. That it opens onto an alley rather than a beach is in spirit with the book as, in its opening anecdote, the cat never did figure out that doors open to summer only when it is… summer.
Eclipse in Chicago
It is not often that one can have a ringside seat at event with cosmic proportions yet come away from its witness alive and even unscathed. Okay, by the law of big numbers there were some who stared and so certainly came away scathed. But it wasn’t you. It probably wasn’t me.
But it was a holiday crowd at Loyola Park and some of them must have peeked. While it wasn’t as common as rock concert joints, filtered glasses were being passed around. But I admit the shadow of the tree was my main focus in this photo. And in fact, shadows were my main focus that afternoon.
First of all, there is the dark and smokey quality to the light itself. Much to my surprise, this photo comes close to catching that quality in a kodachrome sort of way. In these partial eclipses, the sky never quite reaches the sunset quality of a total eclipse but it does have a spookiness to it…
…and ordinary shadows change as well. Despite being less illuminated, ordinary shadows often seem unnaturally sharp… like an echo of an alternate universe.
And sometimes the crescent sun is suggested along the edges of the shadow.
And of course there are the trees and bushes that act as natural pinhole cameras.
It was a pleasant way of spending a warm spring afternoon. It wasn’t quite the spectacle or the adventure of a total eclipse in winter’s Winnipeg, Manitoba, back in the 1970s. I’d tell you about that too but I remember only fragments.
Inevitable
Electric Train
…ghost train…
Photo by Roman.
Wayfaring Stranger
… and speaking of Red Dead Redemption (as we did in yesterday’s post), here is a music video done within that game, a spooky hymn covered by the Longest Johns (4:09):
The video’s YouTube page says:
“Red Dead Redemption 2 is a superb and beautiful game, and we wanted to get closer to the action… so we put ourselves in it!! All footage (other than us) is captured in-game in our first foray into virtual production.
“We had an idea of how we wanted to film a video for ‘Wayfaring Stranger’ a while back, and this seemed like a perfect way to capture it.”
Programmed to Work
This was a recent New York Times Op-Doc, from the Total Refusal collective. “The collective explores the field of contemporary video and computer games through artistic interventions.” (20:20)
From the video’s YouTube page:
“In this short documentary, a laundress, a stablehand, a street sweeper and a carpenter are observed with ethnographic precision. They are nonplayer characters, or NPCs, in the blockbuster Wild West-themed video game Red Dead Redemption 2, and many of them are trapped in work.
“NPCs populate the gaming world as background extras. They simulate being alive, but their rhythm of life is controlled by looped activities — which they exercise tirelessly and repetitively into infinity.
“These NPCs are Sisyphean machines, programmed to get stuck in the routines of everyday life without results. Occasionally, the NPCs glitch, breaking their cycles and revealing their own flawedness. In these moments, they seem touchingly human.
“We’re an artist collective whose work explores contemporary computer and video games. Here, we reflect on the question of work and what’s supposed to be normal. Despite the game’s turn-of-the-century setting, the labor routines, activity patterns — as well as bugs and malfunctions — paint a vivid analogy for how workers today toil under capitalism.
“Can we, the nonplayer characters of a political economy that controls, exploits and alienates us, find a way to rebel against the absurdity of our own activities?”
The Rot
Yip Abides 