In the CA, BIZ-NITCH

Well, I'm in the middle of 2nd week out in California. I'm getting more than a little tired of the rain and wind.

Tonight I'm in for:

Windy at times with periods of rain. Thunder possible. Low near 50F. SW winds at 20 to 30 mph, diminishing to 10 to 15 mph. Rainfall possibly over one inch.

Not fun when your outide carring drawing in dust on a construction site.

I wonder how I'm ever going to afford to live here?

Just can't stay out of trouble

My distance aquiantence Robert Durst is back in the News in Houston.

It seems that after you cut up an old man while dressed as a woman you can't go driving around PA in a rented car, with two .38's and a couple of boxes of bullets.

I still don't get the evidence tampering thing. I was certain that there was a stronger word for that - say MURDER!

To read more about the total nut job. Click Here.

Who are theses people?

These people scare the shit out of me, but I suppose we don't have to worry about their genes mixing with the rest of us and slowing down the phenominal rate we are populating the earth.

I'm on my way to Santa Barbara for the entirety of next week. Should be a lot of work in the guilded cage.

Also, I am an Uncle as of yesterday. Teresa's sister, Dana, and her husband, Brian, gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. I believe she was 8 lbs 2 oz and they have taken to calling her Samantha. I'll send pictures when I get some. UNCLE TUEY.

Durst

What the hell is this about? John and I worked for the Durst’s on the S.I. building a few years ago with DNA so I always like to follow this story.

Um, Yeah, I panicked when, in a struggle for a gun, I killed someone while dressed as a woman and then cut her up. Can I get out of Jail now?

Crazy world. Someone should sell tickets. Hell, I’d buy one.

Brian Rules, but enough

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE BRIAN WILSON. Pet Sounds is one of the most fantastic things ever recorded and if you can't listen to it and hear the amazingly complete things that he accomplished than I pity you. Sure the songs have an innocence and are written from a point of view that is not as continental as Rubber Soul or Revolver, but the shapes and types of sounds that he was creating. The bending of monophonic sound into the full range that he created was only accomplished on a limited basis in recorded music. In fact, outside his Beach Boys efforts, The Beatles and Phil Spector, I can think of no one who could touch him at the time.

That being said, his abandonment of "SMILE" makes any return to that specific process almost worthless except to hardcore Wilson fans. The advancements in recording that occurred through the development of stereo, quadraphonic and surround sound would be very hard for an analog master such as Wilson to contend with. I would be very interested to hear the songs and to hear what he was thinking in his mind from that time but he is 62 now (24 when he gave up the project the first time) and I can’t believe that the music of the last 40 years will not change the nature of the music.

I just can’t see what he’s doing other than completing an addendum to the History of Sgt. Peppers and/or overdosing on nostalgia.

how do you change a dishwasher into a snow blower?

I’m all screwed up today. We went and watched a football game this weekend at a new friend's apartment in the barrio. It was the Cowboys and the Giants and although I don’t really have a strong opinion as to the outcome, I did catch myself rooting for Dallas. I suppose you can take the boy out of the country…

The reason I’m screwed up is because or the nature of camaraderie. It just seems like it used to be so easy. We’d get out of studio at 10:30 on a Wednesday night and 3-9 people would head over to Posse for as many pitchers and cigarettes as we could afford. Before that it was riding around in a circle, flashing people over and looking for the “party” at someone’s house. Now getting together just seems so damned difficult. I almost never see my three best friends in the City.

MWC guy, who is hard to get to come out, must spend a fortune on cabs and trains all to get a 2-3 hours of drinks and a dinner. There’s cpt, who is either working or on his way to Boston to be with his significant other. He’s the wildest person I know who’s never been incarcerate yet if I see him 6 times a year, it’s a lot. Then there’s the guy who live in my same borough, yet it’s a chore to see him more than once a month.

I know its as much my fault (maybe more) that we never have time. It also seems like when we do have time we spend the majority of our efforts attempting to drink our differences away and fumbling between our insincere mates and our general intolerance of those outside our silly little domiciles. I just want to be able to hang out again. I wanna head over to someone’s house and just sit and I want them to do the same with me.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Nothing, watching the Hogan’s Heroes, thinking about going to the Saxon, later on about 11:00”

“cool, I got something I want you to see. Can I come over about 10:00 and then I’ll go with you?

“great”

As it stands, were left hanging out with the people we work with. People who you can’t tell what’s really going on in your life for fear someone will tell your boss or the co-worker you loathe. So, meeting some people in the neighborhood was a great thing. They drink but don’t seem to get stupid. They're smart but not nerds. They’re Republican but they don’t force there shit on you. It was great and I learned a few off color jokes. So, all and all, it was a good weekend.

Dallas Lost!

%%%%%%%

I wonder what percentage of people neglect there blogging activities on the weekend?

I wonder what color my liver is?

I watched Supersize Me yesterday - Jez....

I think I'll take a nap like a good American.

Jack Welch Apartment

I began work on Jack Welch's Apartment yesterday. This is the view of Central Park from his Living room.

It should be a little over 3,000 sq. ft and is on the 44th floor of the Bloomberg Building. This is the view from the Construction lift that is still mounted on the exterior of the building.

A updated photo taken from my office. You will see a window washer's scaffolding at approximately the 44th floor.

Holy Shit! Batman - Taipei 101

I was there less than a month ago and although it was dark and rainy the entire 14 hours I spent on the ground, I wish I'd tried to go see it. I've read most of the talk about it not being the biggest for very long but still this is a weird time in history for Architecture.

Seemingly, Architecture is being valued again but more as a tourist attraction or as a gimic. Almost like a side show.London, Tokyo, Moscow could have "outbuilt" the Tradecenter/Empire State Building years ago. Its just a marketing ploy, almost like the worlds biggest ball of twine.

Lisa Heartman

When I was around 10 (I think), I threw an egg in a sitters hair.

The egg was raw.

It was the day of prom night.

I got nothing on this chick.

Ggggggggggg T. i . g , e. r.

and yet, OJ walks free. I suppose its fitting the tiger has been in jail for quite some time.

I'm also amused at the idea of Time-Warner coming over to install a new cable box between 8 - 12 and / or 2-6 and finding a god-damned tiger in the place.

Gherkin in London

Jokingly, I've said before, but I feel it bears repeating, that "the British shouldn't be trusted to design anything bigger than a hat". I actually have nothing but respect for Sir Norman Foster. Having experienced the level of work from their office during the construction of Asprey, I feel confident that as a whole they are very strong and precise. However this is the largest uncircumcised suppository I've ever seen.

It should also be said that the building, which is owned by Swiss Re, is vastly vacant and financial not doing so well. And not to draw parallels but the Empire State Building was dubbed the "empty state building" for many years due to its development in a uncertain Midtown Manhattan.

Microsuck

I have two computers in the world (three if you count my old laptop that runs Win95) and none of them will run today. I'm XP at work and ME at home and ever since I downloaded the new Service Pack either of them have run worth a damn. Is this a microsoft created hardware problem? Does the new software need bigger and better hardware? Will I be buying new computers every 6 months for the rest of my life like my grandfather did buggy whips?

And another thing. Our home computer is down. Why is my wife angry at me? How is this my fault? I worked from 8:00 til 1:00am trying to get it going. Give me a break, I going as fast as I can.

UM. . .

right

Sun Kil Moon

Ok, day two. Today seems like an easy day. Maybe that’s why this whole Blog thing keeps going. Anyway, I could start in with the Vice Presidential Debate and the way those jerks beat each other up and ignored Gwen Ifill. Or, I could rant about the Nobel Prize and the naming of Ubiquitin (which by the way is pretty amazing research).

But instead, I’d like to discuss the lyric that keep going through my head today from a band called Sun Kill Moon. Their album Ghosts of the Great Highway came out last fall and is fronted by Mark Kozelek, formerly of Red House Painters. Mark you may also know from Cameron Crowe’s movie Almost Famous as a member of the band Stillwater. I am most struck by the opening song on the album “Glenn Tipton”.

As many of you will know, Glenn Tipton was one of the guitarists for Judas Priest. The song begins with a list of adversaries starting with the abuse that Clay took at the hand of heavy weight Liston in their 1964 fight. Clay started the fight a 7 : 1 underdog (If you wanna lose your money then bet on Sonny- Clay quipped) ended up fighting the 5th round blind due to a liniment of Liston’s that got in Clays eye. In the end Clay would win what was to be his last fight by that name as he would renounce his “slave name” and change to Muhammad Ali. The rest of the first verse continues in turn by the recalling the conflicts between Judas Priest’s founding guitarist KK Downing and Glenn Tipton. Next are Jim (Gomer) Nabors and Bobby Vinton.

The song leads, sometimes humorously, around the battles and conflicts that fill our lives and those in it with whom we collide. The late night internal dialog of his father, simple daily struggles and the pain in jettisoning your first lover are all positioned against the more (ok less) famous conflicts of the first stanza. Mark could have chosen more known conflict (think Sonny & Cher), but he didn’t. Why? Maybe to make the average Indy-Shoe Gazer do a little homework. Maybe because he needed the cadence and it just worked. And what about the notion of time/change/dreams which are also hugely planted in each chorus. Any thoughts?

The album's got many other great gems. Try downloading, um I mean buying, "Carry me Ohio", " Lily and Parrots" and "Salvador Sanchez".


Cassius Clay got hit more than Sonny Liston,
Some like K.K.Downing more than Glen Tipton
Some like Jim Nabors, Some Bobby Vinton
I like them all

I put my feet up on the coffee table
I stayed up late, watching cable
I like old movies with Clark Gable
Just like my Daddy does

Just like my Dad did when he was home,
Staying up late, Staying up alone
Just like my Dad did when he was thinking
How fast the years pass

I knew an old woman ran a donut shop
She worked late, serving Cops
Then one morning, baby, her heart stopped
Place ain’t the same no more

Place ain’t the same no more
Not without my friend any more
Place ain’t the same no more
How things change

I buried my first victim when I was nineteen
Went through her bedroom and the pockets of her jeans
And found her letters that said so many things
That really hurt me bad

I never breathed her name again
But I like to dream about what could have been
I never heard her calls again
But I like to dream


Other SKM links

Aversion

Give us this Day our Daily Blog

OK, This is my first stab at this and I can't promise I'll follow up on it regularly but I thought I'd give it a try. I've know a few other people who are having a go of it and thought it might be a little more rewarding than surfing Ebay for vintage guitars or waiting for the news sites to update their cycle stories.

Let me just say from the word "go" that I can't spell worth a damn, nor do I have the skills of the most modest grammarian. However, I do have a rant and if that’s not what the internet is for then why did Al Gore invent it.

That being said....

I'm going to start by publishing something very silly and open ended, on the elephants of Thailand.

1. a working elephant in the teak forrests
   
   
2. an elephant that gives silly tourists rides and are fed, water and provided adequate medical care
   
3. or a wild elephant in fear of being killed for you ivory
   

I think i'm going with option 2.