The tagline on the Art Text website is: “Where text becomes art,” and that’s pretty much right on. I’ve been looking for an app that would compensate for my lack of graphic design skills and this comes close. If you have the Photoshop chops you can probably do everything that Art Text does but even then it’s going to take you longer. This graphic for the Coffee Zone took about 5 minutes to create.
Author Archives: Steve Mays
Ashcroft booed for Obama-Osama gaffe
From rawstory.com: “Former Attorney General John Ashcroft drew the ire of students at liberal Skidmore College this week when he confused the name of Barack Obama with that of Osama bin Laden.
“All I’m saying about the Patriot Act,” Ashcroft began, “is that the elected representatives of this country, including Osama …”
His words were met with a roar of disbelief and disapproval, as he continued stammering, “uh … you know … not … Obama.”
Ashcroft attempted to say “I’m sorry” but was drowned out by prolonged boos.
“I did not mean to … I’m sorry about that … I apologize publicly,” Ashcroft went on as the boos gradually subsided.”
Accident or strategy? Watch the video.
Howard Beale: “I don’t have to tell you things are bad”
I love the movie Network. I went back to a post in September of 2006 to review the prophetic words of Paddy Chayefsky:
“I don’t have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad. It’s a depression. Everybody’s out of work or scared of losing their job. The dollar buys a nickel’s worth. Banks are going bust. Shopkeepers keep a gun under the counter. Punks are running wild in the street and there’s no one anywhere that seems to know what to do with us. Now into it. We know the air is unfit to breathe, our food is unfit to eat, and we sit watching our TVs while some local newscaster tells us that today we had 15 homicides and 63 violent crimes as if that’s the way it’s supposed to be. We know things are bad. Worse than bad. They’re crazy. It’s like everything everywhere is going crazy so we don’t go out anymore. We sit in a house as slowly the world we’re living in is getting smaller and all we say is, “Please, at least leave us alone in our living rooms. Let me have my toaster, and TV, and my steel belted radials and I won’t say anything.”
Well I’m not going to leave you alone. I want you to get mad. I don’t want you to protest. I don’t want you to riot. I don’t want you to write to your congressman because I wouldn’t know what to tell you to write. I don’t know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crying in the streets. All I know is first you’ve got to get mad. You’ve got to say, “I’m a human being. God Dammit, my life has value.”
So, I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window, open it, and stick your head out, and yell, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!” I want you to get up right now. Get up. Go to your windows, open your windows, and stick your head out, and yell, “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” Things have got to change my friends. You’ve got to get mad. You’ve got to say, “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” Then we’ll figure out what to do about the depression and the inflation and the oil crisis. But first get up out of your chairs, open your window, stick your head out and yell, “I’m as mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!”
I am (not) “Howard Beale”
There. It’s out in the open. I feel better already. I am the political blogger who posts under the pseudonym “Howard Beale.” Because I so passionately believe all the things I write, I can no longer hide behind a curtain of secrecy. I’m out, baby!
I’m still trying to figure out how to work my blogging software so I can start using my real name on my blog posts, so you’ll still see “Howard Beale” for a while. But it’s me, smays.com.
And I call on my fellow phantom bloggers to pull off their masks and take ownership of their words. Trust me, you’ll feel better.
UPDATE: Okay, joke’s over. Even my closest friends didn’t spot this as a hoax. That’s scary. This ridiculous post (and photo) should be obvious as a spoof. Looks like the real “Howard Beale” is safe for now.
NOBODY beats the Claw Machine!
Chinese for lunch. As we were leaving, Scott dropped some quarters in The Claw Machine. JUST missed the purple elephant on the first try and got him on the second.
I have NEVER seen anyone beat The Claw Machine. They make the “claw” so feeble it can’t hold any weight. But Scott beat it. As we left, the owner was coming over with a screwdriver to loosen up the old claw.
When it’s too risky to sign your name
Concrete Art
Clarence Lee Shirrell is one of those lucky people who seem to really love his work. He has a “lawn ornament farm” on Interstate 55 just north of Cape Girardeau, MO. I stopped by this week because I happened to notice Miss C, Clarence’s camel (“You can pet her. She won’t spit at you.”)
I can’t explain my fascination with concrete art (if I may use that word). I think it has more to do with the subjects chosen than the process. Which I assume involves pouring concrete into a mold. I think Clarence Lee said he buys the pieces already cast, so is there a big lawn ornament outfit somewhere and how do they decide what pieces will sell? And who came up with the 8 foot polar bear throwing a snowball?
I had a dozen questions for Clarence Lee but didn’t have time to ask them. For example, which is the better seller: the life-size (whatever that might be) demon or the Virgin Mary. And where would you put the demon?
How did he find Crista Meyer, the lady who paints some of his pieces. And do painted pieces sell better than unpainted? And what prompted the loin cloth on the buff young (Greek?) man. Did someone complain about his tiny concrete pecker and balls (yes, I peeked)?
Perhaps the most interesting thing I found at Concrete Castings was the cryptic message on the back of Clarence Lee’s business card: “Finished files are the result of years of scientific study combined with the experience of many years.”
I think that might be up there with “What’s the frequency, Kenneth?”
Fezorocity
Over on the Order of the Fez blog we’re asking the Brotherhood to submit essays defining (describing?) that ineffable quality we call fezorocity. Here’s one graf from Dr. T. Everett Mobley:
“Some years ago, one of the numbers presented in a high school choir concert was a choral setting of Lewis Carroll’s “Jabberwocky”. The director asked me to recite the poem for the audience before the choir sang. Later, I was asked how long it took me to prepare. I replied that there are those of us who have been waiting their whole lives for a chance to declaim “Jabberwocky,” and no additional preparation is necessary. Thus it is with fezorocity, yet it may be that this quality simply lies smoldering within you unrecognized, awaiting only enlightenment to quicken the spark.”
Dr. Robert Fox, DDS
Well-oiled hope machine
By now the Clinton strategists have figured out how the Obama campaign has been beating them. If not, they can read about in the March 20th issue of Rolling Stone. In an article titled The Machinery of Hope, Tim Dickinson provides a fascinating look inside the grass-roots field operation of the Obama campaign. A few nuggets:
“If you really want grass-roots participation, then you have to give folks at the grass roots some autonomy to do this in their own way. We had hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people who wanted to do things. The challenge was: How do you marshal them in an organized fashion?”
“They’ve married the incredibly powerful online community they built with real on-the-ground field operations. We’ve never seen anything like this before in American political history.”
“The Clinton campaign is the last, antiquated vestige of the top-down model. The top cannot organize caucus states; the bottom can.”
“The Obama campaign has succeeded not by attracting starry-eyed followers who place their faith in hope but by motivating committed activists who are answering a call to national service. They’re pouring their lifeblood into this campaign, not because they are in thrall to a cult of personality but because they’re invested in the idea that politics matter, and that their participation can turn the current political system on its ear.”
This article –coming on the heels of Clay Shirky’s “Here Comes Everybody” — really clicked for me and contains the answer to my pals who wink and nudge each other in the ribs while asking, “What makes you think this guy will be any different than all the others?”