This could be cool.



Antiquing...the sign of senior citizenship. Antiques, canes, scotch...two outta three ain't bad.

Just back from a weekend in the nation's capital (business). I love D.C. Beyond being my place of birth and pre-diaspora homeland of my people (a figure of speech, I'm not Jewish) I just love the place...excellent urban planning, tons of green space and interesting diverse adjacent communities. Or maybe it's all pure reminiscence. Whatever, I love the place.

Although Reagan National may be a security nightmare, there's nothing like an airport smack dab in a city like that. I can't think of any other major city with an airport so close to the city center. An urban planning masterpiece at once a security nightmare. As is par for the course I got stuck with about a 2 hour delay waiting for my 36 minute flight back to New York. I got myself a Washington Post and settled into the airport TGIFriday's.

Monday morning, page 2 of the Post sports section is a column "Couch Slouch" written by Norman Chad. How did this guy get this job? Couch Slouch Norm's column yesterday "Bright Lights, Big Games" outlines why he thinks the 2012 Olympics in NYC is a farce by ripping the Jets, the Yankees, the Mets, the Bronx, Times Square, Ed Koch, Manhasset, the East River, Lexington Avenue, Spike Lee and Oscar Schmidt.

You're from New Jersey aren't you Norm? It's ok, the Skins will take any fans they can get. And you didn't mention the Giants, Nets, Knicks or Rangers which have bitch slapped your adopted D.C. teams for years. Whew, can't you just smell a sore loser 300 miles away?

Another thing, New York City is not the "unofficial capital of American capitalism". It's the center of the universe. Get your facts straight.

My intent with this blog has been to stay away from true controversy, politics, morality, etc. but with the Iraqi prison abuse scandal and all the claims that it was an "un-American phenomena" I had to chime...hence my post of last week. I was somewhat peeved at myself for wasting time on that post when I could have been concentrating on softer, more fun happenings like the new Swatch ad in Times Square.



But after watching my usage soar in the week following my "Lynndie England" post, I have to now add a postscript. To support my claim that the particulars of the Iraqi prison abuse and the media reports that followed really are indicative of a current truly base American mindset, here are the Google searches that brought people into the inner circle in the past week:

Lynndie England sex video (more than 20 searches)
Lynndie England nude photos (more than 50 searches)
Lynndie England group sex
Lynndie England naked

When examining the IP addresses of these searches, the vast majority (say 98%) came from the good ol' USA.

I'm not sure what's more disturbing: the fact that people are actually interested in seeing the murk surrounding this scandal (which is understandable really...morbid curiosity) or the fact that there are some truly sick bastards out there that want to see that troll naked. Goddam people, there are 400 million metric tons of quality porno online...HOW SICK ARE YOU?!?!? Pretty damn sick...

One last note...neither of these searches were among any of my search strings in the past week:

Lynndie England trailer trash
Lynndie England worthless hick

I rest my case...

They say this whole Iraqi prison abuse scandal is totally "un-American" and against everything American stands for. I agree, it is indeed against everything America stands for (on paper) but I disagree that it is "un-American". A point made by a local reporter from West Virginia hometown of the freakish trailer trash Lynndie England's says it best:

"A lot of people here think they ought to just blow up the whole of Iraq. To the country boys here, if you're a different nationality, a different race, you're sub-human. That's the way that girls like Lynndie are raised... Tormenting Iraqis, in her mind, would be no different from shooting a turkey. Every season here you're hunting something. Over there, they're hunting Iraqis."

Sure, to the educated culturally diverse communities in New York, LA, Chicago, Boston, etc. this prison abuse scandal is indeed totally un-American. Get yourself 200 miles from either coast or major metro center and I think you'll find the quote above much more the American mindset.

Yee HAA Lynndie you done showed them towel head bastards who's the boss! Now get home and hatch your welfare baby quick now so you can be ready to vote for Bush again in November. In the meantime all of us in New York, LA and DC will ponder when the next bomb will drop on us because of you worthless hicks and the worthless hick you put in charge.

Have you heard about this guy Corey Arcangel? He's part (principal perhaps?) of the "multimedia programming collective and record label" Beige. The basic premise, as I understand it, is to create art, music, etc. by extracting/cracking and reworking images and sounds from late 70's and 80's first and second (and possibly third, depending how you cut it) generation home computing and video game systems (Atari 800, Commodore 64, etc.). I learned about Corey and his "art" while checking out the Whitney museum 2004 biennial.

It's an interesting concept but calls the question "what is art". The visual piece of this doesn't blow me away. If you call pulling the Mario out of Super Mario Bros. and looping the sky and cloudscape "art" then good on you and good for Corey. I'm not sure. What Corey, Beige and other "software artists" such as Radical Software Group are doing sampling the audio on these games is much more interesting.

If you're in New York, check out the Whitney biennial. Some very good stuff. For some good examples of this "cracker" art/music, check out the RSG website.

And if you're like me and prefer a little more pack to the punch, go beyond this software art to Nintendo-core: Horse the Band. These punks knock your ass over and hold you down while Princess Zelda has her way with you. R. Borlax, definitely in the top 5 of 2003. Beware however, Horse the Band, prefer their market young and fit as Erik the keyboardist warns here. Nice. I'm well past 30, got a job, no tits and no basketball jerseys so I guess I can listen. Although Horse the Band is some heavy stuff, it's not sick...this, my friends, is sick (from 1986...the same year the first 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System was released).