Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Can I get some catchup with that?

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Florencia by Nícola Costantino

Our world is a busy, ever-changing place and our individual lives are often so cluttered that we don’t even notice what’s going on around us. I believe that my addiction to NPR, keen insight, and expert analytical skills qualify me as an able and educated informative source. Therefore, I have filtered and summarized the important news that is going on around us, in case you missed it. After all, we owe it to ourselves to be educated citizens. So, my little green lovelies, here you are.

Supposedly, Monday was Columbus Day, and I celebrated by doing laundry and indulging in a bucket of blue bell homemade ice cream. That’s about as American as it gets. Then yesterday, I hear that it’s Leif Erikson Day. Who? Oh right, isn’t that the old honky that owns a car dealership in the hill country? Well, cheers to Leif on this day of his. May his dip be plentiful and his spit cup never empty.

To everyone’s shock and disappointment, recent evidence has uncovered that teenagers in Canada are eating and smoking leaves as recreational drugs. Authorities and concerned parents are puzzled with how to handle this newfound realization.

While doctors down under proved to the world that vodka saves lives, a mother in Minnesota proved that surfing the net kills children. This mom got more than she bargained for while shopping for shoes online. Buy one pair of strappy sandals and get a charge of manslaughter FREE!

Entomologists and public health officials have uncovered an operative plan to halt immigration, terrorism and overpopulation and it is already claiming its first victims. In efforts to appear innocent they have unleashed deadly strains of viruses to be carried by unknowing messengers like bacteria and insects. What’s worse? They’re pushing it off on supposed natural disasters. A heavy humid wet season would obviously bring stagnant water, messy lakes, and an uncontrolled spread of parasites and diseases. Okay, fine. But explain then why so many innocent boat-loving civilians have fallen victim to deadly amoeba in Texas lakes and the Florida coast. Then a man from the UK comes to vacation on American shores, and returns home in a coma. He was bitten by a mosquito, but this was no West Nile, my friends. This little stinger was carrying the deadly Equine Encephalitis Virus, otherwise known as Triple E.

WWJD? Faithful Brits believe they can answer this question. Jesus would be an organ donor. The Church of England urges believers to give of themselves, literally. Next time the offering plate is passed to you, if you don’t have any nickels and dimes, you can throw in one of your kidneys. It’s the Christian thing to do.

While all of these breaking news stories have been affecting our world, life as I know it has managed to carry on in its regular fashion. Here’s some thrilling documentation of this normalcy:

Let’s see…
I went to an art opening at the swanky, marble-floored Volitant Gallery downtown.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Angeliska Polacheck
Found Object/Mixed Media

The Volitant will be closing shortly, and for their final soirée, they are displaying the works of 14 women artists in an exhibit they call Femme Fantastique. The mixed media eye candy was an excellent representation of the feminine spectrum from quirky to cultural and grace to rebellion.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
Spring from the series Seasons by Wendy Red-Star

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Femme Fantastique will be hanging in the beautiful gallery space until November 10. Volitant, you will be missed.

After the opening, we walked across the street to Austin’s underground jazzy lounge, The Elephant Room. We were treated to a heavy dose of rhythm and blues and a killer performance by incredible musicians.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Sitting near us at the bar was an interesting man who appeared to be an avid thinker. He was busily jotting down notes on square bar napkins and seemed totally consumed by this. By the time he had gone through an entire stack of napkins, we had a healthy dose of scotch runnin through our veins and we began to pass notes to introduce ourselves. That’s how I met my new friend, Georgie.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

That’s George. He’s an extremely philosophical man. Maybe lonely, maybe heartbroken, but most definitely not apathetic or cynical. If you put a beret on him, you’d think he was plucked right out of the beat generation. He loves jazz, Picasso and PBS … and scribbling on napkins at bars.

Labels: , , , , , ,

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home