Social Whale

My friend buys all his polo shirts at Social Whale. They look good -- color, fit, etc. I'd buy there too, but I have too many, both clean and many more with paint of them. What would you expect.

Nice logo sown on the breast.

Linsay Lohan and Big Foot

I have a grainy video of Ms. Lohan playing ping pong with
Bigfoot at some northwest lodge amid tall conifers. In the video they are laughing and playing spirited ping pong.

Suddenly, Bigfoot drops his paddle and runs off into the woods. Ms. Lohan gives chase but stops. A single tear runs down her face. I believe the video to be authentic and will realise it when I've been given clearancy by my legal team.

Lindsay Lohan Crying

I have sources in Betty Ford but they're not talking yet. Soon, though, I'll know if Ms. Lohan is sincere about changing her life or just wants to be a tabloid caricature.

I'm not so much interested in when and where she first cries, but is she making progress? Does she want to make progress? She will not always receive money from the fund that pays celebrities to act out and flirt with the criminal justice system. So, "watch out" is good advice, especially since she doesn't have family money like Paris Hilton. She could end up roommates with Kate Gooseflesh in some celebrity gone bad "rancher" in Valley and die in an earthquake.

I'm already bored with her antics and think her part in Titanic was highly overrated -- pouty mouth when the ship is going down!

Aging, Sickness and Death (Oh, Mirrors Too)

Many people remodel their bathrooms in middle age, even late middle age. There seems to be a biological clock that drives the need for mirrors. The clients also have old bathrooms and several decades of acquired capitol.

One of the main features of the middle-aged bathroom is the expansive mirrors -- even boundless mirrors. It is as if the face that has been lifted expands across the universe in a demonstration of some about-to-be-revealed demension.

Mirrors mirrowing mirrors is another common design idea. If the mirrors are not parallel, an infinite reflection slowly bends toward the horizon line. One's droopy bottom with celulite and its luner surface is drawn relentlesly toward a black hole.

Working around mirrors can be disconcerting if the workman accepts aging, sickness and death as the effect of mortality. It's been many years since I've painted in the nude.

Hairy Irishman

Charles Dickens leased a house then had it remodeled. When the work was complete, he would write Bleak House. He made this observation during the remodel.

"Yesterday week, I saw a hairy Irishman cultivating mortar with spade-husbandry in the room I am to write in!"

I have often been the hairy Irishman in rooms practicing some form of husbandry while the client hung around with curiosity -- "that's what they do" -- or with the satisfaction of having one's property attended to as an extension of one self.

Unfortunately, no client has ever been great at anything -- least of all empathy for other human beings. They've just made or inherited money.

Hairy Irishmen who have worked for celebrities always come to the same conclusion --"asshole." A famous a journalist, a leftist, was such an asshole that his contractor had to punch him to bring him to his senses or just knock him down.

A Miracle

By the end of the week, I knew Seamus was different, but I didn't know how different until I sent him to the paint store for thinner.

"No need," he said. He took a bucket and filled it with water. It was lunch time so I didn't say anything. I let him put the bucket into a room and close the door.

At lunch he said he was going back to Ireland soon to become a priest. It's not often that a painter announces his decision to enter the priesthood at lunch. We cleaned up our language after that.

After lunch he handed me the bucket. It was now full of thinner. We took him out for drinks to celebrate his priesthood and I to celebrate his miracle. I tried it several times, but couldn't get thinner from water.

Later I heard that Seamus had gone to India and was living in the mountains above Rishikesh. He had not become a priest. He was studying with an Indian Guru. Let's hope he doesn't turn the Ganges into paint thinner.

Celebrity Compactor

There are too many celebrities. I have in mind the development of a compactor, like garbage compactors, that will merge, by force, celebrities. This merging should be done with some thought, although the compacting/merging criteria needs some input from medical ethicists.

(Imagine compacting two medical ethicists. What tie would prevail--bow or conventional or possibly a string tie like Colonel Sanders)

My first compaction would be Lindsay Lohan and Kate Gosselin. I admit, I haven't given much thought to the new celebrity as an outcome of such a compaction. I just think it is important that compaction get underway. It is in a sense, a second or third front of environmentalism and energy conservation.

Yes, I do believe that the world is overpopulated and that there is a human redundancy, most glaring in the category of the celebrity. But we could move on to politicians, billionaires, slum dwellers, etc. Compacting would not involve abortion or the distribution of condoms -- the bugaboos of conservatives.

Imagine Jimmy Swaggart and Oral Roberts compacted. Or to be fair, our President and Vice President.