Isn't it good? (a conjecture)

Many years ago, while filming the movie 'Help', in the Indian restaurant scene, George Harrison sees one of the Indian band members noodling on a sitar during a break in the scene. It was a cool-looking gitbox and it made these funny squeaky sounds. Intrigued, George buys one for himself. Albeit, a cheap, tourist trap version from one of the Indian bazaars around London. George, famous for being the industrious Beatle learns to play the instrument on his own, picking out lines and melodies and even tries to play blues licks on it. He was more or less, finding his way around it. Around this time, they had started recording Rubber Soul in the studio as well. John wanted George to play the song riff in between breaks. The song was "Norwegian Wood". It was about some tryst someone (presumably John) had and it was existentialist and full of cynicism, very Lennonesque, so to speak. It is in fact one of my favorite songs of all time. During the takes, George was still struggling with the sitar that it took him way too many tries to get the riff just right. Not the most patient man and since the song has pretty much been recorded except for the sitar fills, John storms out. George, later overdubs the fills alone in the studio after learning the riff and spots studiously. After that experience, George takes on to the sitar wholeheartedly. He meets a virtuoso by the name of Ravi Shankar and studies under him. George spends so much time with Ravi that he even accompanies Ravi on these long trips to India. While there, he immerses himself in the culture, religion and music of India. During these long trips abroad, he often left his wife Patti Boyd in London. Maybe he'd asked to Eric Clapton to baby sit her, we don't know. But that's another story. With meditation and the Maharahishi and all that, George gets even more inward as a person. His songs become more meditative and mystical and starts to have a more Indian feel to them. In the meantime, Ravi starts becoming this huge international celebrity. He's asked to perform in rock concerts, music festivals and command performances for the bigwigs. His face is all over the music mags and various publications. He becomes a 'rock star', with his own deck of fans, followers and of course, groupies. And one of them was beautiful Sue Jones.

Picasso and death in the afternoon.

I dreamt I was in the middle of a fierce one on one basketball game with Pablo Picasso. Actually, I'm not sure it was him but he sure looked like Pablo. He was about 60, bald on top with gray hair on the sides. He was wearing a white wifebeater (sando) and striped boxers. I don't remember if he was wearing shoes or not. The bball game was in someone's garage and the basketball hoop was just a cheap ceramic punch bowl or some kind of flower pot on a ledge or a high shelf. We had to be careful with our shots which were mostly layups. We didn't want our hoop to come crashing down. Anyway, it was a tight game. The old man was ahead by a point. Whoever got to 5 points first, won. It suddenly occurred to me that I had to win this game somehow. That there was more to this game than just winning or losing... I had to try real hard to beat this old man who was just so quick in his defense and shot making. I had to win because I was playing against Death himself. Shades of Ingmar! It was a long struggle in a long afternoon. We were dead even at 4 all. Somehow, I made a reverse layup into the 'basket' and the ball stayed in. I won!!!

Dead Possum Society

Since I only lived 2 miles from work, I sometimes took the occasion to walk.  Took me about a half an hour at a brisk pace.  The exercise was great as well.   I would walk on this road that has a park on one end, a strip mall on the other side, with the Trader Joe's, 24 HR gym and a Chevron station at the corner.

About midway is another park and there were tons of rabbits, the usual squirrels, possums and whatever critters indigenous to the valley.  One time as I was nearing work, I spotted a Roadrunner doing its "dinosaur strut" shuffling towards some bushes on a slope near the freeway.  Wouldn't you know it, just minutes after the I see the roadrunner, I see a coyote on a ridge, casually walking and sniffing around on the hillside. It was that kind of a neighborhood.

One day while about midway to work.  I spot some kind of roadkill up ahead.  As I'm getting closer, I see it's a possum or what used to be one.  On its back, its arms upraised as if vainly trying to ward off the attacker. The "attacker" was most likely a speeding car driven by one of the high schoolers who was about to be late for his first class.  The possums sharp teeth were bared and its face in a final death grimace. It was as dead as a doornail.

Poor sap.  What are possums' means of defense anyway? Playing dead? "Uh oh, here comes a truck! I think I'll play dead and maybe it'll ignore me..." On the other hand, maybe he was still just playing dead.

When did...?

I was at the market the other day getting groceries when I heard this older gentleman looking through the egg cartons in the dairy section muttering to himself. "When did eggs start costing $3.00 a dozen?".... I felt bad for him. When you're on a fixed income like he probably was, you'd hope some ordinary household staples and grocery items would remain the same, pricewise... but naww! In this brave new world, you'll hear this rhetorical question of "When did...?" being uttered more and more and mainly because us boomers are about to retire. Here's a sampling: When did rap become recognized as music? When did athletes become the 2nd coming of the Messiah? ...

Bobby Chiu's Routine

Just read this in an email notification. Offhand, it seems to makes sense. It's hard to create a routine in a creative atmosphere FEATURED ARTICLE Five Key Elements of a Great Routine from Bobby Chiu By Flynn Ringrose Number One is to wake up hours before your day job begins and spend that time doing your own stuff. This is very effective, but it’s difficult to keep up with because it often means you have to get up at 4:00 or 5:00 in the morning and that’s especially difficult in the Winter when the Sun isn’t even up at those times! This is great because, one, you’re beginning the day doing a hard thing which makes you feel good because you started off with something challenging. Two, when you get up hours before work and do your own art, you’ll see results, that you created something, and that makes you feel even more productive. Why give your best hours, and this is weird to say, but why give your best hours to your job? Why not give it to yourself which will in turn, benefit your job? Number Two is, don’t do emails until the afternoon. If you email them in the morning, then they might respond to you in the afternoon and you’ll have to respond to them twice in a day, instead of just once. Number Three, make your to-do list the day before you need it. I like to write my to-do list around 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon. Just go through it ahead of time to update it with what’s important now and what you’ve finished. This is important because if you come into work in the morning and you know exactly what you need to do, you’ll be more efficient. If you don’t write down the first thing to do tomorrow, that’s when you’ll stand around the water cooler talking to your friends, get a coffee, look on the internet, whatever it is. It’s hard to get momentum when you start off slow, but it’s very easy to keep momentum when you come in running. You get through so much more stuff that way. Number Four, spend a minimum of 5% of your income back into your art. Spend this money on education for yourself, equipment, and networking. Equipment meaning a new computer, art materials, etc. Networking means going to conventions, workshops, that kind of stuff. A minimum of 5%. For me, because of Schoolism, I’ve been able to go way beyond that because I don’t need to spend money a lot of times to educate myself so I can spend money on other things such as attending events but after a while you get invited to events so you have to spend that money elsewhere and so on. As you start down your artistic path, that’s what’s going to happen to you and it’s going to get harder and harder to spend that 5% which makes it even more awesome. Number Five, always find room for non-urgent but important things. There are usually consequences you strive to avoid that force you to attend to super important and urgent matters in your life. Like you’re going to lose your apartment, the taxman is going to knock on your door, whatever it may be. But the things that aren’t urgent but are important, those are the things that are going to excel your life. Like maybe learning how to use ZBrush, even though you just like to paint. That’s going to help you in some way, you might not know how, but it’s just like how Steve Jobs learning typography helped him make the Apple Computer. Stick to those five things, and you’ll notice dramatic improvement in your productivity and career if you haven’t already. Bonus Q&A Does a routine really make a difference in your art? A lot of artists swear by only doing art when they feel like it. Do you think that’s dangerous just waiting around for inspiration? Man, the people who are waiting around for inspiration, they’re in trouble most of the time. Especially if you’re working on a film, waiting for inspiration, and you don’t do anything all day. Then what are you going to tell the director? What are you going to tell the producer? You can’t do that! And actually, the routine helps with that because if you have a good routine, you generally won’t have bad drawing days if you just stick with that routine. The only time I experience bad drawing days is when I don’t stick with my routine. Was there a time when you thought that you’d never need a routine? Totally, that was part of the reason I wanted to be independent, because I wanted to do my own thing and I didn’t want people telling me what to do and when to do it. Then business started picking up, and more and more people wanted to work with us. And when you want to work on more stuff, and accomplish more things, you need to have a routine to maximize your time. If you just go by the seat of your pants, you’re not going to accomplish as much. You might accomplish more interesting things perhaps, but not as many productive things.

I don't believe in ghosts...

One restless night I was having trouble sleeping. I usually have the TV timed to shut off in say about 45 minutes. I usually have it on the TMC channel where they sometimes show obscure classics I can't relate to. So, basically I was struggling to get some good shuteye, adjusting my pillows to and fro while drifting in and out of sleep, going through some several anxiety ridden dreams which I don't remember. While half asleep in a semi-fetal position, facing my bedroom window, I could hear this sobbing next to me. It was soft and incessant and seemed to come from behind my back, someone, who was sitting on my bed. For some reason, I surmised that the sobber was my mother who had passed on many years ago. She was crying for me. Feeling sorry for me, as it were. After a while of this, I told my "mom", "Mie, it's okay. I'm fine. Really! Calm down. Everything will be ok." Then the sobbing stopped. Right about this time, I was fully awake and sitting up on my bed, scanning the room in the dark. I don't believe in ghosts, I reminded myself. Then went back and finally was able to sleep.

I've been wanting to paint...

I've been wanting to paint but I just can't seem to get started. Two christmases ago, I bought myself some canvases, paints and brushes. My nephew Mark, who teaches fine arts even gave me some huge canvases. So far, it's been a blank. What is it about painting? I get inspired looking at paintings and even some graffiti. What keeps me from doing it? Fear of failure is one reason. Putting aside material time is another. I even got myself an ipad with painting and drawing apps loaded in. I have one of those bound books with blank pages inside. There are a few attempts in there but none that pleases me enough to show them off.