So yeah

It's been a ridiculously long time since I last posted, but life has been pretty freaking crazy. Taking a sculpture class this semester. Holy crap, I suck at sculpture. I have officially proven that I am not terribly good at three-dimensional art. Though I do kinda like my plaster project. It's water. It's cool. I will post pictures later, cause it's pretty freakin' awesome.
I rule at English. No kidding, I'm totally terrific!! Yay me. However, my latest essay is having some difficulties. Writing about lowbrow art (Ed Roth, R. Crumb, Fritz the Cat, cool stuff like that) but having some serious problems with finding info. Anybody wanna direct me to some really good sites about it? Cause this essay is going to rule, if I can find info, and I'm looking forward to whole paragraphs about pornographic cartoons. For a grade. Yeah, that's just supertacular.
Classes are otherwise boring, so I've been watching too much TV. Pushing Daisies makes me want pie. Someone must bake me pie. Pie, pie, me-oh-my, I love pie. Also, cute twin Neddy brothers. Adorable swooning fan-girl-ness is imminent. Sara claimed them, but I'm going to make her share, it isn't my fault I watched it a day late. ::pout::
WE MUST SAVE PUSHING DAISIES FROM CANCELLATION!!! That was my caps-lock quota for the day.
Oh, and McArmy on Grey's Anatomy is freaky. That guy gives me the creeps. Christina needs better taste in men.

Wanderlust

With school out and Andrew working so much, I find myself bored and lonely. I'm reading a lot, mostly the fantasy genre (Christopher Moore makes me happy) but trying to get around to the classics. Existentialist literature and beat poetry intrigue me, if only I had the money to buy books books books. I especially want Clockwork Orange. Wishing I felt inspired to write more, but sadly I have nothing to write about presently so my poetry just seems to be lacking anything. I have no good brushes, so I cannot paint.
Sometimes I feel a little trapped, I want to travel. To go to Italy, Japan, France, Spain. Or even just Chicago, New York, San Francisco, Las Angeles. I want to visit the museums and see the houses of the artists and wish I were a part of a real art scene. Like Crumb, Warhol, or even Pollock. I'm growing restless.

Been awhile

I know, I've just been really busy, what with school and two crazy kids. Anyway, I just wanted to upload the finished sketch of my son. Technically, it's an all new drawing, since I started over, but I got new drawing pencils and HAD to try them out.
Anyway, here it is.

Scholarship

If anybody who happens to read this could take a moment and vote for my drawing (the link below) I would be very grateful. If my drawing gets enough votes I could win a scholarship.

Show Us Your Art 3 Brickfish

Really Pascal?

Did you think I was gonna buy that tripe? I mean, the sheer selfishness of it, deluding yourself into something you don't really believe for the sake of an eternal salvation that has only a slight possibility of actually existing. It seems almost lunatic, to force yourself to go along with an idea you find completely unreasonable on the off-chance it might actually be true. If that's a good idea, should we also all wear aluminum hats on the mere chance that the aliens really can take over our minds without them. By Pascal's reasoning, this would be a terrific idea. The aluminum hats don't hurt anyone (besides making you look really silly), and if the aliens really will take over you'd be screwed without one, right. Why take that chance?
Even accepting that going against all reason and common sense to believe in God is a great thing, which God do we choose? Pascal says the Christians have the right idea, but who's to say Allah or Buddha or even Zeus isn't the better choice. I haven't yet heard a decent argument for Christianity over the other billions of religions.
And besides, as Blackburn says, who's to say God really does reward belief in himself? I have a little trouble accepting that a completely perfect God would be vain enough to require that people go against their own common sense (which He apparently gave them) and attend mass once a week. Or spiteful enough to send them to Hell if they don't. Aren't vanity and spite considered flaws, even in religion? And God is supposed to be perfect and flawless right? So, then, why would he exhibit purely human traits.
I think a perfect God would be more likely to send people who were decent, tried to do the right thing, and followed their gut instinct to heaven, than people who lied about their faith in the hopes of getting rewarded. Doesn't seem like a very noble or good thing to me, even if you eventually delude yourself into true blind faith.

Swinburne?

Does anyone else think Richard Swinburne's philosophies on the problem of evil are a little... um... sketchy? He says that the existence of evil doesn't disallow the existence of god for most of the normal reasons (free-will and all that much debated b.s.) but he mentions that suffering at the hands of another is a good thing, because it means you are of use to the universe. Excuse me, but what? I don't think that my painful and torturous death (or anyone else's) at the hands of a sadistic monster can be considered a good thing, even if it is allowing human beings a choice between good and evil. And I will never be comforted by the thought that "at least I didn't die in vain." He's wanting me to be happy that some jackass gets to decide to kill me? Seriously, I'm a pretty selfless person (I think) but this is ridiculous. And besides, who's to say people want to be useful anyway. Apparently, Swinburne does.
He mentions that a study of unemployed showed that most people who are out of work claimed they most disliked feeling useless in society (as opposed to the lack of money). I say that's crap. I've known a lot of people who lost their jobs, and they didn't feel 'useless to society'. They just felt pissed off that they'd been fired, or maybe sad that they couldn't provide for their families. Society doesn't factor into it.
Am I the only one who thinks this line of reasoning sounds a little communistic? (Is that a word?) As does his statement that dieing for your country is a wonderful thing, even if you were conscripted and fighting for a cause you don't believe in. I wouldn't want to die for the 'War on Terrorism', even if it was 'for the good of my country. It sounds like the position of a privileged white male who's never seen any real hardship to me.
And what about this crap about having 'the right to cause your child to suffer for his own good'? By this reasoning, couldn't you make the claim that child-abuse is a good thing? The parent could say it's his right and it's for the child's own good and Swinburne would apparently agree with that. I'm sure you could take this reasoning even further and do a whole lot of really awful shit that was justified by "free-will" and "the greater good". I think Dostoevsky had it right, I don't think the ends justify the means. The cost is too high.

Anyway, on a more artistic note, what's with all the commercials lately trying to be 'artsy'? That black-and-white Papa John's commercial with bits of color thrown in that looks like a low-budget Spielberg film? It irks me (that's right, I used the word irk, what're you gonna do about it?). And what do castles have to do with pizza anyway? Blah, it's not even particularly creative. That style of cinematography is getting a wee bit overused. Black-and-white for the sake of looking 'high-end' and 'artistic' is used way too much lately.

Self-Song

'Tell me
about yourself', he said,
as though I could possibly explain
who and what and when
and how I am
in any terms that HE would understand.
Should I tell him I'm an artist,
a writer, a painter, a poet
full of images pulled
from out the darkest recesses
of my mind
of his mind.
Shall I explain to him
my troubled past
those sweet invisible scars
which trace the lines of my veins
deep beneath the surface
where only I can see them
in the night
behind my eyes
where the days that have past before
and will come again
fly by in hideous circles
plaguing me with their evil intentions.
The days and the daze,
ever haunting me with the truth
of what I was
of what I am
of what I've done
to myself
and to so many others.
How can I tell him,
how can I explain the pills
and the songs
and the nights with no sleep
but plenty of rest
lying in my lover's arms
talking of existence
and the chance to mean something,
anything,
to someone.
He will never know
my desperation,
desperation to be loved
and needed
and seen as more than just
the stereotypical
artistic chick with a dorky side
full of angst and secret passions,
for I am so much more,
more than just myself
or him, or you, even.
I am a conglomeration,
a mixture of all
those who have come before
and will come after,
a puzzle built up
of a myriad small parts,
each day, each choice,
each failure or success,
and he will never know,
HE will never know,
he will never KNOW.
'Tell me about yourself.'
'I'm no one special.'