F O U N D

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This is a song performed by The Coughs when they played with The Flying Luttenbachers at Fireside Bowl on February 28th, 2004. Sorry about the long delay intro. AudBlog really needs some rudimentary sound file editing capability, don't we all agree? That girl has some pipes on her. She can scream better than any horror film princess I've heard.

Brian posted at 11:57 PM.

This glove was sitting on an iron fence outside a senior citizens residence on Damen and Schiller. I walked passed it, but then it reminded me of a situation I observed one day. I was sitting inside a starbuck's coffee when this elderly couple were walking by. Something on the ground had grabbed their attention. I leaned forward against the window to see what. It was a glove. They looked at it and discussed it momentarily. Then the man picked it up and he placed it on top of a potted tree on the sidewalk. It looked like the tree had grown a hand out the top. It was like a pine tree, to give you a better visual. Like a small christmas tree with a hand on top. Anyway, they started to walk away, again discussing. They stopped about 30 feet away and the man turned back and took the glove from the tree and placed it back on the ground where he'd originally found it. I thought it was a pretty concise dramatization of that whole lost things situation. I'm ambivalent about it. I mean, people think they're being helpful when they lift things to eye level, but if you lose something, you look on the ground, where you assume it fell, gravity being what it is. And so, if you're looking down, you don't notice the thing someone, with good intentions, understandably, placed at eye level.

I occasionally entertain the idea of picking up all the loose gloves I find and setting up a web site called www.theotherglove.com, which would post found gloves and people could look to see if the glove's been found. I doubt I'll ever do it, but it seems like a good idea, with some marketing behind it.

Brian posted at 5:25 PM.

This item is decayed. It is implicitly dangerous and lethal, but sort of in a wash-ed out, castrated way, since it's so decayed. It represents fragility. I like its shape. I've photographed it on a huge wood block I bought for $4 at a store that was selling it. It was used as a display for their products. I don't know why they didn't want it, but their loss is my gain. I thought for four bucks, I couldn't go wrong. I had to carry it a few blocks home though and it's quite heavy, and a little cumbersome. It's about a foot square of solid wood. Dense wood, too; I don't know the family.

Anyway, although there's not contrasting color in the photo, there's the contrast of nature and industry, which I like. These confluences of disparate notions are really interesting to me. I have a theory about people being most entertained by conflict and tension. I'm sure if I looked around I could find some academia to back me up, but why bother, right? I'm comfortable with how things are.

This object was found in the lot of a car dealership in Sarasota, FL. I assume that they used this razor to scratch stickers off windows. Or perhaps the insane car salesman used it to cut their coke to make it finer before snorting it through one-hundred-dollar bills.

Brian posted at 1:16 PM.

I know this is really gross, but what really struck me about it was that it was also yummy looking. I'm pretty sure it's feces (presumably canine) covered with blue pearlescent confetti. Now, what series of events led to this? Really? A dog birthday party? Dogs aren't as embarrassed about pooping in social situations. However, the snow in the area had melted recently, so perhaps the dog doo-doo was deposited first, then more snow fell, then someone came by on New Year's and was in a celebretory mood or what have you... Or maybe someone just wanted to put confetti on dog poop. Who knows?

Or perhaps it was a magical dog from a cartoon like the Care Bears or Rainbow Brite. Maybe it was magical rainbow poop. Maybe I should have eaten it and might have been granted fantastic super powers. I could have been able to expand or contract my density, or fly, leaving behind me a trail of rainbow light, or perhaps I could have been able to emit blasts of light energy?

Brian posted at 3:40 PM.

This magnet was proudly adhered to a napkin dispenser at a Sarasota, Florida bookstore. I saw it while visiting there a few weeks ago. It sparked several conversations in the short time I was in the cafe area reading. Surprisingly, a lot of Floridians are not fans of President Bush. Or maybe it's just the ones who frequent bookstores? Hmm. Boy is that a dumb guy or what? I heard him on the radio the other day talking about the weddings happening in San Francisco and he said something like, "I am a firm believer in the idea of marriage being something between a man and a woman. I am alarmed by people who are trying to define marriage." How come every time he speaks he iterates nonsense? How did he get to be president? Oh yeah. He cheated. Whoops.

Brian posted at 12:52 PM.

When I came into the restaurant, a guy who looked like he was probably homeless was paying for his meal with change which he kept in a paper Coke cup. He said the the woman behind the counter, "I hate pennies."

I thought it was pretty interesting that a homeless guy would hate any kind of currency. I later figured that he probably hated pennies because it took so many of them to buy anything, but they were much heavier, and therefore more burdensome, than say, a dollar.

Brian posted at 5:42 PM.

At Jewel (Chicago grocery store) yesterday, I was checking out in line. It was the express lane. As I was finishing up, I heard this:

Teller: "I'm sorry ma'am. 15 items or less."

Customer: "But I have two different orders."


Classic.

Brian posted at 10:51 AM.

My camera is pretty damn kick-ass cool. I took this picture w/out flash (on a tripod) and using a digital zoom of X2. It came out pretty good (oh, I should mention that this item is about a half inch in diameter, to give you an idea of why I'm impressed - that and the subject was about 16 inches from the lens). That, plus it's been dumbed down (that's what I call the shrinking of a file size in order to accomodate for ease-of-viewing on the web; I don't know if anyone else uses this phraseology or if phrasology is a word, but that is beside the point, the real point is that I anthropomorphize lots of things especially having to do with computers, which I suppose will eventuall not be considered anthropomorphism because they'll be ALIVE - yes I've had a cup of coffee - shut up). The camera is a Minolta DiMage X, for whatever that's worth.

Anyway, this is a blue cog. I'm not quite remembering where I found it. On the street? I'm pretty sure I found it at a construction site, but I know I found it relatively recently and I don't remember being at a construction site recently, so it may remain a mystery. But I like the blue cog because 1) It's blue, which has been and remains my favorite color, and 2) because it represents mechanization, which I think is really cool too. I often pick up cogs. If you'll scroll down, you'll see another one. Well, below is a cog thingy, not really a cog. But for all intents and purposes on my end, it's a cog because if I use it in art, I will incorporate it where it looks like it represents a functional cog.

So, why do I like cogs? Pieces of a whole...?Functionality...?Universal wholism...?Divinity...? I don't know. Just for some reason, cogs-in-motion=beauty to me. I suppose I'll have to eventually spend some time trying to figure out why.

Brian posted at 9:48 AM.

What's so great about this is that it was staring up at me as I walked up my litter-strewn Wicker Park street. I mean, what a nice little message amongst the other rather malign detritus. So uplifting by comparison. I was tempted to leave it there, hoping it would brighten up some person's day, the way it did mine. But I guess I'm ultimately selfish, so I had to have it for my collection.

I do wonder what the hell it was made for. It has an adhesive back, like a sticker. How many were made? Was it placed on a product packaging? What product? Or was it art? Part of a performance piece? Either way, it's a nice piece all by itself.

Brian posted at 5:46 PM.

I found this the other day in the bathroom of Filter, a cafe near my house. They have blackboard walls, so anyone can tag anything they like.

Scatological humor is the lowest common denominator, but that probably means it also reaches the broadest audience. I certainly thought it was pretty funny.

But I guess if you think about if they re-wrote the Lord of the Rings adventure and made it about a pile of poop, that would be pretty gross. Unless you're into scat. Then it would be erotic.

There was other scat humor. Things like, "Poop. Read. Leave." I thought about changing "read" to "eat." That would be pretty funny. Or gross.

I guess I'm just trying to get in the mind of the person sitting there and putting this phrase on the wall. Was it some dorky LOTR guy? This neighborhood is really artsy. Maybe it was someone trying to be profound. Chicago is also pretty...y'know, I dunno, sarcastic? Immature? When I think about some of the people floating around here who are considered part of a community...Sheesh. Well, suffice it to say, someone thought they were pretty goddamn funny. And here I am perpetuating that. I guess I'm a Chicagoan.

Brian posted at 2:22 AM.