The Life of Times (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} disreprivalize) wrote,@ 2008-07-03 23:15:00 |
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| Current location: | Nirvana |
| Current mood: |  ecstatic |
| Current music: | Pathetique - Beethoven |
| Entry tags: | book, i ain't nevah lied!, people scare me!, photos, pictures, too long to be fully read |
You've Got To Admit It's Getting Better, Getting Better All The Time
It can't get no worse.
Tuesday was a good day. Since I had nothing to do I decided to do it away from my house. I woke up early (10 a.m.), did some laundry so I could go out clean, made myself breakfast, showered and left. All with minimal television/computer interruption. I did burn myself a cd because the illegal version I downloaded was not in a format itunes recognized and also the sound quality is much cleared and louder than through the fm transmitter I would have had to use.
So off I went, enjoying my drive and wishing I had somewhere even further to drive, and eventually arrived downtown. I decided to go to the El Paso Museum of Art, or EPMA as I like to call it, because it is free. I am not that into looking at art but I tried not to let that keep me from enjoying myself. I skipped the downstairs portion because it is the Chicano or Southwest or Mexican-American part of it (Donated largely by Cheech Marin? True story!) because I'm tired of that kind of art already, living in El Paso. I guess I get it. They want art that is representative of us here. But so what? I'd like to see something new. There were some pretty interesting works though, to be fair. They weren't all Diego Rivera knock-offs.
There was this mother-daughter pair there who it kept ending up behind and was afraid they would think I was stalking. I even sat down on one of the video exhibits and read for a while from Scene Weekly to see what else was going on in el paso. Two video exhibits were bad; one, by Zeque Penya, was interesting. I'm afraid to say 'good' because I don't know a lot about art and I'm afraid one of you will get upset that I think I know what I'm talking about. I'm pretty sure you'd agree if you saw them though that they were bad. Or at least I'm sure I could convince you. Probably by saying noncommittal things like, "You like that? really? huh," and you'd backtrack like, "Well, I mean some aspects of it are interesting." and I would say, "Maybe to a child or to a blind man seeing for the first time in 30 years." Or maybe to a Mexican who sees a hispanic name as the artist.
But I kept ending up behind them, is what I was trying to get to. Also, I looked at the whole spacious open local art exhibit as a work of art in itself because I'm deep as shit. and I liked the baroque area. Their paintings look just like the subject!
I left and decided not to go to the other nearby museums because I was all museum'd out. I walked in the direction away from where I was parked and looked at some big statue of someone who found the pass to the north for a second and then wandered around downtown. I went to Dave's Pawn Shop and was dismayed to find the Blues Brothers were no longer in front of the store. Elvis was still there, though. Also still there, the alleged finger of Pancho Villa($9,500) and the Crucified Baby Vampire Heart($3,000? I don't remember). I wasn't aware babies could be vampires! I guess we have the olden tymes to thank for that. They must have killed them all. Then I went inside to look at all the Nazi Memorabilia, the life-sized Hulk Hogan statue, the mummy, medical butt-plugs, and musical instruments. They have a huge stack of Clarinet cases and I was going to ask how much they would sell one for but I didn't want to ruin my day with speaking to someone.
I left and wandered again and I came upon a mysterious building called "The Mansion". The windows were all boarded up and there was a sign on the door that said something akin to "for emergency purposes only". What is that place? Google doesn't help so it must be haunted or something. I walked a couple of blocks and came upon a guy who might have been homeless and I asked him, "What is the deal with that The Mansion building?" His eyes glazed over as if recalling distant painful memories and he told me, "Ain't been no mansion there for quite sometime. In fact, that mansion been dead since a year ago this night!" With sudden dread welling up in the pit of my stomach I looked back and clearly it was still standing there.
I walked through the bus terminal, past the fire station, and up the back up the convention center. Did I mention I took pictures?!
I had my parents Kodak camera, I like to take photographs, so Momma don't take my Kodak(chrome) away. It doesn't take very good pictures(My awesome photography skillz don't factor into it) and I knew it so I just decided to take quick shots of my surroundings while I walked. I learned from the camera that El Paso builds all their buildings at a slight angle.
To the right is the bus station. There is also a lady hiding behind one of those trees.
From here on you'll see the date stamped on the photo. I thought I was going to try and crop these out before posting. Boy was I wrong.
Here is a good example of how disorientingly slanted Downtown El Paso was built.
I was almost to my car at this point but I was tired to I decided to
WARP SPEED!!
You'll notice by the clarity of the Date Stamp that this IS NOT Photoshop'd!! This is actually Warp Speed!!
Then I just started trying to take pictures while driving.
This one is titled "Wasted Potential; Pretty Clouds"
I tried getting some drivers but rushed it each time. I call this series "The Futility of Capturing Time: Like Sand through a Sieve"
I titled this one "Reflections"
Even the mountains are slanted. Legend has it that is why El Paso architects designed their buildings always at angles.
Lastly, this one is "Shining a light on Juares: El Paso's purely symbolic efforts to crackdown on the violence of her Mexican Sister-City: La Razza Mourns: The Reckoning"
And a day of doing nothing isn't really complete for me without the visit to Starbucks and Barnes and Noble. How corporate of me!
Me and some other guy walked in to the store about the same time but decided to take two different routes to the line. I took to entering through the back of the line like a civilized human being. He took to walking to the front, because no one else was there, so why not, right? We both got the the front at almost the same time. He sheepishly said he was sorry just I as would be expected of him and I sheepishly said, "Don't worry about it" kind of implying he could stay up front. But he didn't and so I was fine with ending our conversation there.
The person who was paying finished and the employee walked away to make his drink. So I walked up to the cash register to get ready to order and a fat and gay-sounding guy stood next to me with half a finished bottle of Fiji water. The classiest water you can buy. At first I thought it was the guy who just ordered trying to tell her something because I noticed the guy was fat also and that is as far as I get to noticing someone when they are fatsos like that. But when the clerk came to get my order the thing said "I'm just going to pay for this." I flashed the vendor my 'what the fuck?' look where I furrow my brow and tense up the corners of my mouth and darted my eyes sideways as if gesturing to that guy. No words were needed. Everything was communicated in that instant. So she asked, "wasn't he here first." and I said triumphantly, "Yes, I was." That fat guy was crushed. His mouth dropped open and his eyes glazed over, as if recalling some distant and painful memory. Probably the memory of looking in the mirror that morning!!!!! Asshole.
So whatever. I got my Venti Iced Black Tea Lemonade (Unsweetened) and started wandering the aisles. I decided on getting the Barnes & Noble classic books because they had a 3 for 2 deal. And the books I purchased were as follows:
Siddhartha - Herman Hesse: The gripping tale of one man's quest for Truth
Walden and Civil Disobedience - Henry : The gripping tale of one mans quest to live by himself in the forest and another gripping tale about one mans quest to be upset that he has to pay taxes.
The Prince - Niccolò Machiavelli: The gripping tale of one man's to fuck some shit up, treatise style. The author is perhaps more famously known as Tupac Shakur.
I decided to read them in that order to make sure I don't lose my edgy jaded qualitites.
I finished Siddhartha today and highly reccommend it. I would call it 'beautiful' if I said those kinds of things. Instead I'll say, the ending was kick-ass. It made me want to drive a motorcycle into an airplane and not weep ever. The notes kind of annoyed me though. At one point they gave away an important revelation that happened in the very next paragraph! So I read the note and was confused because I didn't remember reading that important fact. They should have put SPOILER ALERT. Like this:
SPOILER ALERT!! Buddha dies in the end! The book isn't about Buddha, so don't get upset.
So, I guess not a lot got "accomplished" since my last entry but I'm not really going to think about that.
And you know I ain't NEVAH lied!
That's my new signoff.
