Lovely Photos of Industrial Things

Also from NPR, Susan Stamberg reports:
"Margaret Bourke-White was one of the most famous photojournalists of the 20th century. A Bourke-White picture made the cover of the very first issue of Life magazine. She was one of four staff photographers on the first masthead, the only woman on staff, and invented the photo essay for the magazine." (plow blades to the left, 1930-----1930!!?)


(women peeling onions for Campbell's soup, 1935)


(self portrait,1943)

Talking Head

I did an on-camera narrator job on Friday for a website. The Georgia Superior Court Clerk's Cooperative Authority website. Yes, the big break I've been looking for! ... And it just rolls off the tongue.
The director guy calls to get my sizes for wardrobe, that he says HE'S going to go buy. A suit. Banana Republic khaki-suit type of look. Ok, that's fine. Classic. Ok. I give him my sizes. Honestly.
I get there Friday morning and he says, I couldn't find a suit in (your size), so I got the next smallest. I grimace. Teeth clinched. And he's only bought 2 options. 2 suits in a size smaller than what I usually wear. Day of the shoot.
Yep. First suit, too small. Not just too small for my ass, but the sleeves of the jacket don't reach the end of my simian arms. I look like a sausage coming out of the casing. mmmmm.
Next suit, fits better, still tight, and is a good suit (Ellen Tracy...for the ladies) but is kinda ugly and the client doesn't like it. These are $300 and $400 suits!?! What?! People pay $400 for a pants suit?! Sheeit.

While they're still setting up lighting stuff, the CLIENT goes up to the Edgewood shopping center to look for other options, and I'm sure they're pissed at the director guy, but it's all making me feel very self-conscious.

They get back with a ...Ross (dress for less) bag. With a khaki suit in it. A $29 suit. A size BIGGER than I usually wear. Wow, that other suit must have really looked tight. The pants to this Ross suit have an elastic waist band. They are clownish, they are so big. And the jacket had a seashell star pendant on the lapel covering up a sewing goof, and looked--when on me-- not unlike David Byrne's Same As It Ever Was Shoulder Padded jacket. Which would've been sort of fitting for the job I was doing.

Obviously, this won't work. So they go with the uglier, less-tight cream-colored suit. The whole day, whenever I looked down, I could not help feeling like I was waiting for a plane to touch down on Fantasy Island next to a trusty, if not overly confident, midget.

The shoot was long, tedious, but there was a tele-prompter, and it was well-paying. Thank god they had a hair/makeup person. One who looked to me like a perfect cross between Leigh Hayes and Stacy Melich (Cynthia something, Leigh and Tiffany, you probablyknow her).

I wrote the director an email today, saying you know, thanks and all, good to work with you, and sorry my big ass wouldn't fit into your suits.

Seriously, I wrote that.

Sort of funny thing is I just picked up 2 suits, IN my SIZE, one Banana Republic and one Benetton, from a Freecycle person (in Inman Park) Friday night. Free. She left them on her porch. I picked them up at like 11:00 at night. She was having company over. The kind of company that sits around with glasses of Scotch, and a decanter on the table between them. I know this, cuz I stood at the window looking in, wondering if I should explain my presence or thank her. I decided not to. But they just HAD to see me. Dan and I immediately regretted our decision to not either:
1) knock on the door, ask if I could try them on in their bathroom, or
2) try them on right there on the porch.
If I only had the balls.

Anybody home?

The Decemberists ---I don't know anything about this band, but I've heard them mentioned by non-squares in a lot of cool circles. Haven't I? You tell me, you are the cool people I learn these things from.

Well, Colin Meloy, the frontman, will be playing a solo, live acoustic webcast tonight, Saturday night, on NPR. Article says he will be performing this solo work along with Laura Veirs, singer-songwriter.

All of this begins at approximately 7:30pm.

I'm just sayin.
UPDATE:
They have the taped live performance available here.
I find this funny, PBR is the sponsor for this concert. Worth it just to listen to the NPR-voice-guy say, "Pabst Blue Ribbon beer" at the beginning.

Stylin' - profilin'

I just recalled a conversation I heard while in the bathroom stall at The Local several Sundays ago.
Girl 1: How are you and your boyfriend doing?
Girl 2: Oh. We broke up.
1: Oh, no. I'm sorry.
2: Oh, no. It's cool.
1: So you guys are still friends.
2: No not really.
1: ohhhhh.
2: He was fine, but it was just like, NONE--of my friends liked him.
1: Right on.
2: I mean, every one of my friends hated him.
1: Right.
2: And, you know, like, whenever we were out at a bar or something, and he got up to go to the bathroom, every guy at the bar would always talk about what a fag he was.
1: Right, right on.
2: "He is such a fag, Lauren, I can't believe you're dating him!"
1: Yeeeah. So, right, he like just didn't give you what you wanted?
2: Oh, no, he gave me everything I wanted, he was pretty much everything I'm looking for.
1: Oh, right, yeah.
2: I just, you know, nobody ever wanted to go out with me if he was coming.
1: Ohhh, that sucks.
2: Yeah, big time.

Probably pretty close to verbatim.

I stayed in the stall til the conversation sounded like it was coming to an end. I wanted to see where it would go. I was right....nowhere, and fast. Before coming out, I drew a mental picture of what I thought they would look like, and I was pretty damn close.
You know these girls. Go ahead, generalize. Sometimes there's a reason for stereotypes.

Thanks to mc chris

for sending this ridiculous thing along.

Good LORD, that's funny. And, I might add, adorable.

Nice guys finish first

If you mean finish living.

Our Netfix queue has 276 films. I've always felt that I would not live long enough to ever reach the end of it, even if we stopped adding right now. Chris Penn's death just reminds me that I'm probably right.

And to stay away from any and all of the Sheen's.

What a freaking shame.

As Mr. Vonnegut would say:

So it goes.

"If I die-God forbid-I would like to go to heaven to ask somebody in charge up there, 'Hey, what was the good news and what was the bad news?'"

So it goes.

Interview with Kurt Vonnegut on NPR.
Plugging his new book, A Man Without a Country in which he apparently says that people are "chimpanzees who get crazy drunk on power." I'll buy that.










I love that guy.

And so on.

->Freecycle<-

Heard of it?
If you want to get rid of something, you just go to your city, click on it, post it there, and if anyone wants it, they contact you. So, obviously, you can go there to see if anyone has stuff you need.

Posting Guidelines:
Everything exchanged must be free, legal and appropriate for all ages (I'm looking at you, Leahy)
There's no trading, bartering, or exchange of money or services (h.jobs)
You must post an OFFER before a WANT
No pets

And, as always, no fatties. (freecycle sure is picky)

Subject Lines – (please ... no substitutions):
OFFER: old couch. (include area where you live, i.e., Morningside)
TAKEN: old couch (posted by person offering)
WANTED: old couch
RECEIVED: old couch (only when you've receive a wanted item)
ADMIN: used by moderators only

Haven't tried it but I'm about to go looking for some things and post a couple, too.

Widdi T. told me about it, but I'm just now getting around to checking it out. She said, I believe, that she got rid of something like "a folding lawn chair" in a day.
People need shit.
People have shit.

There ya go.

Update!
whoa, just checked it out, and someone
OFFERED: vinyl Falcons checkbook cover and someone has already
TAKEN: vinyl Falcons checkbook cover.

Ok.

Maybe everyone's already seen all this stuff, could be. I'm rarely in the know. But, since we just got a NEW COMPUTER, I can watch this stuff easily, now.
Robot Dance.

And I for some reason love this video these girls made for the Pixies' song "Hey."

Man, dancing.

Somehow, this sort of explains why I made the New Year's Resolution that i did.

"Yes," no?

The whole of this film is written in verse,
It must have taken some time to rehearse.
The acting was tight, not a scene of it loose.
But I couldn't help but to think "Dr. Seuss."

Too long on some love scenes the camera lingered.
But how often do you get to see Joan Allen fingered?
Heavy handed at times, no pun intended.
So many film styles in one film are blended.

But some beautiful monologues, I must confess,
about there being no "no," there is only "yes."
And in case by now you hadn't heard,
Mary Kraft is a big f-ing nerd.

Here is one actual quote from the film, made by the main "cleaner" (maid-- played by Shirley Henderson who is awesome when you can hear/understand her) who speaks to the audience at intervals throughout:
And, in the end, it simply isn't worth / Your while to try and clean your life away. / You can't. For, everything you do or say / Is there, forever. It leaves evidence. / In fact it's really only common sense; / There's no such thing as nothing, not at all. / It may be really very, very small / But it's still there. In fact I think I'd guess / That "no" does not exist. There's only "yes."

Oyyy!

Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World.

I love Albert Brooks.
Haven't seen this movie, yet, though.

He's so funny to me, yet ... annoying, somehow.
He can be or seem gaggy, yet he's smarter than that.
His delivery can be Catskill-ish at times, but once you think about what he's doing/saying, it's deeper than that.

In classic-Albert-Brooks-style, the link to the picture above of him has his name wrong. They have Alan Brooks. That's kinda funny, too.

Hmmm. He was born in Beverly Hills. Odd.
Oh my god! I did not know that his brother is "Super Dave Osborne"
Oh my god! I did not know that Super Dave Osborne's "real" name is Bob Einstein.
Why is his name Bob Einstein?
Their dad's name is Harry Parke. ?? And he was a comedian aka "Parkyakarkus."
This is simply too much.

I've heard him tell a story about working on Taxi Driver.
Said that Robert DeNiro was SOoo "method," sooo in character, that he wouldn't even talk to him between takes or anywhere on-set. Wouldn't give him the time of day.

Then he went to the wrap party, and he still wouldn't talk to or look at him, and it was then that he realized DeNiro just--didn't--like him.

Ayyy!

Ever sneeze while holding a hot cup of coffee?
I've done it almost every morning for over a week.
Note to self: GET more TABLES! That should be a good quick-fix.

Ever been in your car and gotten a cup of coffee from a gas station or fast food place and it was too full, so you take a paper cup that was already in your car cuz you're a slob and leave trash in there and you pour some of the excess hot coffee off into the paper cup so that you don't burn yourself trying to drink from the too-full cup, and the hot coffee burns the bottom straight out of the cheap paper cup and it's as if you've just poured scalding coffee straight into your lap?

That was funny. feeling.

Her?

This is from Robert in Chicago:
"Arrested Development" fans: February 10 -- mark it on your calendar. That will be the two-hour season (series?) finale of this show, beginning at 8/7c. Wonder how it will do opposite the Olympics' opening ceremony.... Showtime and ABC have inquired about picking up the show, though no news on this front as of yet.

Moving on

I've wasted enough time and energy on The Book of Liz. It's time to waste time and energy on other things. Although, I must say, Rachel B., when I saw your name on the comment list, I had a mini-stroke cuz I thought it was Rachel Craw from the show. Yikes! Even though I had good things to say about her, I guess I shouldn't write the bad things on the internet if I don't want everyone to see it.
Jesus, I'm already back on the damn play!

Moving on.
My New Year's Resolution is to smoke more pot.
Hear me out---and drink less beer.
But the year's getting older and so am I and I'm not really any closer to achieving my goal. Shit, last night alone I drank my January's alotment of beer. Now I'm gonna have to borrow from February.
So, let's all work together on this one and really dig our heels in and make this happen.
I know we can do it, IF we do it together.
I find the best goals are the easily attainable ones that other people help you attain.

(click photos for articles)



So, let's have a code word, or code phrase, so when we're together we'll know it's time to help Mary achieve this goal--how about..."Owww! My eyes hurt!"

See, that was easy.

...
...
Owww! My eyes hurt!

wink. wink---OWW!

proof

Peter Hardy says here's what Wendell Brock had to say in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

BOOK OF LIZ ROLLS OUT GOOFY, GOOEY BALL OF FUN
In this ridiculous concoction, Sedaris family fans will see glimmers of Amy's hopelessly lost Jerri Blank ("Strangers With Candy") and David's fascination with misfits, potty humor and kitsch. The latter's satirical essays can be splendidly entertaining, but in this picaresque howler, the siblings give voice to their warped observations by sketching 3-D cartoons that exist in an outer frontier of silliness. Director Lee Nowell's cast is game to wallow in the tasteless fun and chew on a script that riffs on religious hypocrisy and the empowerment kick while sending up vintage Hollywood potboilers and American classics from "The Scarlet Letter" to "The Crucible." In "Liz," [the Essential Theatre has] picked a turkey - in a good way. Stuffed with cheese and sleaze and covered with nuts, the show is a sinful treat for Sedaris fans and their brethren.

And here's Curt Holman in Creative Loafing:

Amy and David Sedaris' The Book of Liz follows a member of a low-tech Amish-style sect as she ventures into the brave new world of strip-mall America ... [Rachel] Craw makes the woman a sympathetic, gently humorous foil to the kooky characters she encounters, from a dancing Mr. Peanut to a pilgrim-themed restaurant populated by members of Alcoholics Anonymous. Director Lee Nowell sets a snappy pace and gives enough leeway to Topher Payne's posing, hair-waving Brother Brightbee and Dede Bloodworth's dithering Sister Butterworth to find huge laughs without going too far over the top ... inspired silliness.
I say:
buulllshit.

hmmmmmm.

she said you gonna stay?

i said if you want me to, yes.

drove to savannah today, and brought with me Bob Dylan (Desire), Steely Dan (Aja) and The Kinks (Well Respected Kinks).
i think my favorite album of all time is "Desire." (looks like you can go here and listen to samples)
i missed an exit listening to "Isis."
part of the reason i love it so much may have to do with where i was when i heard it for the first time--Montana, summer, with a group of super cool people, really honestly super cool and hilarious--you all would absolutely agree with me on that, with Glacier Natl. Park literally a mile behind me.
it's a pretty unbelievable place to do anything.
Now, drink your big black cow, and get outta here.

New to me

unnecessary censorship

Reminds me of one time when my (sweet, older, very conservative) dad was up staying with us in the apartment. I asked if he minded me closing the bathroom window cuz I was getting cold, he said, "oh, no, Dan just said sometimes he likes to open the window to air the bathroom out after he takes a sh-- (my eyes get huge) --ower."

Urology shoot

had a job this morning. for Bard Urology, whatever that is. 7:00am calltime. ouch. small job, would hopefully be half day, but good money for that, so....
no lines. but a second look at the script yesterday uncovers the part where a "paratrooper drops down on the nurse (me), taking her down." nobody mentioned that to me when they booked me. "are you okay with that? do you have any physical limitations that would keep you from doing this?" none of that.
good money, short day.
good money, short day.
we get there, 7:00am. no coffee, no waters, no bagels, no crackers, nothing. that's fine, if you tell me there won't be ANYthing. i'll grab something from home, but with no mention, that usually means, yeah, we'll have some snacks here.
good money, short day.
the nurse/doctor uniforms aren't the right size, the right color, there aren't enough surgical caps--whatever. not my problem, at least.
the "paratrooper" who is going to take me down turns out to be huge. giant. I had to ask if we were going to put down some sort of pad or blankets or something in the general area where i was to be tackled by this guy...seriously, he was probably 6'4", 280. "oh, uhhh, sure, we can use some of the sound-proofing blankets."
good money, short day.
that part with the tackling stuff actually turned out to be fun, i love that shit, as long as it's done right. and the guy did it right.

the frantic producer/director/wardrobe stylist/writer tries to fashion a surgical cap out of a lab coat from yesterday's shoot. my hair's in a ponytail, and she just wraps material around my head and ties it in the back, it looks like a nun, not a nurse. it looks ridiculous. whatever. she figures she'll cut off the excess material....so she just starts cutting. and as i inhale to exclaim that my HAIR IS IN TH---, she inhales and starts saying "oh my god, oh my god, oh my god. .....i cut your hair!"
"no you didn't."
"yes i did."
"you're kidding."
"no."
"yes."
"what?!"
"I'm sorry."
"you're kidding."
"no, look." she shows me a big clump of hair in her hand. her hand's shaking. i feel bad for her, immediately.
as calmly as i can "i have a big audition out of town tomorrow, so i just need to be able to get out of here in time to go find someone available today to fix it."
"i will get you more money, we'll get you more money for this. we will pay you extra for me doing this...."
i figure a hair cut and a little extra.
she offered an amount that i told her was excessive.
the agent didn't really think it was excessive, citing "pain and suffering." that is funny.
being a dick about the whole thing would have made the whole set unbearable, it was done, it couldn't be put back, she was in a state, and was sorry.
i was able to make it into salon red in candler park for a 12:30 hair cut.
it's shorter than i'd like it to be, but the cut was free.
great money, reeally short day.
why do i feel so dirty?

Futile Atempt to Save the Bluths

I saw this posted somewhere recently. Anyone else seen it?
http://www.petitiononline.com/Arrested/petition.html

along with this:
www.saveourbluths.com

I dunno. I signed the petition. I'm a real follower.
Broadcast tv just really f-ing sucks. I'm a real state-the-obvious-kinda-girl.
Anything worth watching will eventually move to HBO, which I can't afford.
I'm real broke.
Skip, where's Flying Car Television?!?!
I've been listening to some of The Ricky Gervais Show on the recommendation and heads up from tastypiesinc.
I don't know if what I listened to was a "podcast" or not. I think I tried to sign up for a podcast, and this computer didn't have the system requirements. HBO and Win XP...just out of reach. One of these days....
But, anyway, I listened to something, with Ricky, Steve Merchant, and Paul Pilkington. Ohhh, I downloaded an MP3 from The Guardian.
The podcast can be found here. And other good links are here.

Ahhh, technology, thou art both virgin and whore. At once a key to treasures untold and a dagger twixt the breasts, wealth above wealths and a jive-ass case-quarter. Suck it.

If "wish"'s and "but"'s were clusters of nuts, we'd all have a bowl of granola.

Dan gave me the Strangers with Candy box set of dvd's for Christmas. I love it. The three of them (Colbert, Dinello and Sedaris) are great together. It's chock-ful-o-little weird funny things. Apparently the movie version has been sort of shelved? The first 2 seasons are funnier than the 3rd, to me. I think they ran out of steam. It got gaggier. The mother, Deborah Rush is brilliant. Man, do I love to see truly funny females, boy oh boy.

Also, Amy and David Sedaris' play "Book of Liz" is being performed by Essential Theatre at the 7 Stages back space. Call 404-523-7647 for reservations, and visit www.essentialtheatre.com for more information.

Chrissie Bielinski's going with me--she got the recipe for and made Amy's signature cheese ball for her Christmas party. Anyone else?

Accch! Just got an email that the pay-what-you-can-night is tonight, Monday the 9th, at 8:00.

Update!
Accch! I just saw it. Oh my. How did only one person "get it." Rachel Craw was good in the (thank god) lead part of Liz. YI-yi-yi.
Nope.
Sorry, Chrissie. Forgive me, Widdi.

The Gay Applebee's

That's where Dan and I went to eat Friday night. I guess maybe we should've known by the two x's in the name --Roxx. Looking back now, yeah, that looks and sounds real gay. Or maybe Roxx's location on Cheshire Bridge would've clued us in, but we've gone to a few places that were not specifically gay establishments. But a simple google search would've told us all we needed to know--about Roxx.(pleeease follow that link) Not that we wouldn't have gone had we known it was a gay restaurant, but...well, yeah, we probably wouldn't have gone. Well, maybe we would've. I just don't know. I think we would've filed it away in another compartment of our brain had we known. Like, Blake's or The Oscars are bars, so we could go there to have a drink, but boy, The Yacht Club sure sounds better. Why is that? I don naw. I ought to go to more new places. Note, taken.

It's a "tavern and grill" and almost looks like an Applebee's or an upscale sports bar from the outside. But there's a different kind of sport going on inside Roxx. But back to the beginning.

So, we are not 2 feet in the door and a guy says, "Dan Triandiflou!" and sort of squeals. Big hugs. Actor, of course. Someone Dan worked with up in Cherokee in like 1998. After our drinks are ordered I go to the bathroom, and when I come back, there's sort of a party going on at our table. Turns out 3 people from Cherokee work at Roxx. 2 guys and 1 girl, the manager--who says, "What brings you two over to the gay part of town?" Still didn't hit us. "Oh, well we live around the corner." What tipped me off were the number of all-lesbian tables that absolutely could not be a coincidence. So, I sort of stage-whisper over to Dan, "I think this is a gay place." Once the scales (scales--foreshadowing) fell from our eyes, everything was just kind of funny. Like the trailer of Ticklesack---I mean Brokeback Mountain (thanks to Dan for that one).

The upside to a gay restaurant? No kids.

And we thought, well, I bet the food's good, at least better than Applebee's.
Aa---uuhhh--yeeeah, no.

We ordered some 'tavern chips' --homemade potato chips with cheese, just tasty cheesy potato thingees. When the manager girl brought them out, she said, "these are on me, you guys." That was nice. ....Thanks for nothing. Cold. Cheese not even melted. I mean, bagged, pre-shredded cold cheddar cheese just sprinkled on top of cold potato chips. Which were sort of stale. So it was really like eating potato chips from a bag. Chewy potato chips. Cuz how do you send something back that was free?

I ordered a grouper sandwich---i know. ?? It wasn't, well, it wasn't good. I had half of it, and didn't really know why I ate half of it. This is maybe the strangest part of the night, for me---for whatEVER reason, every time I took a bite, a visual of the Putt Putt golf course in Savannah would pop into my head. And some water would kind of drip out of the sandwich. Oddly enough, I added a little malt vinegar to see if that helped. Wow. No. One word: feet. Then to further confound myself and Dan, I asked for a to-go box. They were being so nice, I guess I didn't want to let them know that the food sucked. Ridiculous.
Dan's chicken sandwich was "ehh." The slaw had no taste. Salad tasted like it was bagged lettuce, with that smell that bagged lettuce gets.
"Save room for dessert?"
We had some sort of joke about what shitty thing they'd bring out for dessert. If I think of it, I'll edit this. It wasn't a Band-Aid Parfait, but something like that. Though a Band-Aid Parfait is pretty funny.

On the way home, we couldn't stop laughing while coming up with ways of describing how a waiter would actually describe the fish sandwich. You can imagine what some of them were--you can even leave some in the comments section, if you'd like. My favorite was "How is your grouper sandwich?" "The grouper--yes, we take a nice, fresh piece of grouper, then we roll it up in a pair of dirty socks, tuck it gently into a dead hooker's vagina, push her into the Chattahoochee, letting it age for 12 weeks,freeze it, thaw it partly, then batter and fry. Partly."

Other than that, though, yeah, it was pretty good.