Trashball 013108: The Chianti Lobby

This is an actual prescription handed out by a very expensive psychiatrist.

Trashball 013008: Devil in the Flesh

In 1946, the food editors over at McCall's magazine evidently had a penchant for the vilest meals imaginable. It's meant to be steak and asparagus, but you can just make out the face of Mephistopheles in that slab. And what on earth is that thing in the upper-right corner? No matter how you slice up the radishes, nothing makes me wanna eat from this sordid tableau.

Trashball 013008: Cowgirl - Cowboy

Cy Twombly-esque piece of paper found blowing across Picacho Ave., here in Las Cruces.

I Need to Get Spanked 38 Times

Who knew Norman Rockwell could make it look so wholesome? Wait, Rockwell could make triple amputation look wholesome.

Trashball 012608: Poodle Enthroned

Okay, so I love miniature poodles, but I really love that chair. These old photos came from a Washington, DC, estate. Ellen, if you're reading this, I think we found Daisy's great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents.

Trashball 012508: Mother Teresa Would've Loved This

Undated photo found among various ephemera in DC. As Christopher Hitchens says, Mother Teresa did not work to relieve poverty, she supported and received sustenance from it.

Trashball 012508: Handmade Greeting Card

The inside of the card says, "We Like You Anyways" and has an outline drawing of several nuns, probably because the card was made for a psychology professor at Catholic University.

Trashball 012208: Little Country Doctor

Yeah, I liked playing doctor as a boy, but I was never kitted out like this! From the same 1950 Life magazine as the previous post.

Trashball 012208: For All You Vinyl Fetishists Out There

Terrific image from a 1950 issue of Life magazine. Yow!

Trashball 012108: Dear Grandma

Eloise, if you're out there, please come to my place once a week.

Films of the Day : Bad Lieutenant and Holy Smoke

Bad Lieutenant and Holy Smoke were both, fortunately or unfortunately—depending on how you see these things—on television today. Bad Lieutenant is probably the stronger of the two films. This means it's a strong fucking film. Harvey Keitel proves in each film that he is one of the least egotistical actors now or ever. This freedom he gives himself to be human in every way—whether beautiful or ugly—lends his performances rare power and poignance.

Trashball 012008: Hand Shadows Are Fun

One has to be really well articulated (and I don't mean in the verbal way) to do "The Hare." From a 1956 activity book.

Trashball 011908: Parking Lottery

Legally parking in Italy is truly a gamble.

Trashball 011908: Ricordo di Roma

Trashball 011908: Some People....

Some poeple
Look with daggered eyes
Think with knives
Say ugly things
And hate themselves
As they well know

These people, even those with
Their Hello Kitty looks
Uselessly conceal
Their sophomoristics
And it appeals to know—

The Seniors are gonna be there
The Seniors are gonna get them

New Painting: "Spavined"

Spavined, 30 inches x 24 inches. Acrylic and ink on canvas. $430. Click on the price to purchase.

Biddie's Motel Napoleon Ohio

The apex of old linen postcard coloration. Absolutely gorgeous.

Trashball 011908: Headmaster Ritual

This old photo makes me think of only one thing—this song.

Trashball 011908: Evolution of Man

From an old tailor's work-ticket.

Wish I Wrote That

One of my favorite opening paragraphs:
Cities at night, I feel, contain men who cry in their sleep and then say Nothing. It's nothing. Just sad dreams. Or something like that...Swing low in your weep ship, with your tear scans and your sob probes, and you would mark them. Women—and they can be wives, lovers, gaunt muses, fat nurses, obsessions, devourers, exes, nemeses—will wake and turn to these men and ask, with female need-to-know, "What is it?" And the men say, "Nothing. No it isn't anything really. Just sad dreams."
First paragraph of The Information, by Martin Amis.

Should I Keep the Beard?

Here's a recent photo. I just can't decide—should I keep the beard?

Oh, umm, sorry. Still.

Trashball 011708: My Horrible F#*@king Studio

Actually, with a bit of manipulation, it looks fairly cool. But then, doesn't everything, with a bit of manipulation?

Film of the Day: Once

Musicians are the luckiest people in the world.

Click here for a trailer.

Riga Sprats

If you're like me, you enjoy the occasional tin of Riga Sprats. I was just consuming a tin at my computer when I idly googled "Riga Sprats." Well, turns out there's a thriving online Latvian community that is compiling an international index of where Riga Sprats are sold. So if you've got some info, please tell them.

Painting of the Day: "Lady Agnew of Lochnaw" by John Singer Sargent

For me, this painting is a thousand times more powerful than dowdy old Mona Lisa. This beautiful woman completely beguiles and inveigles me.

Trashball 011308: The Shirred Bib

From an old National Bellas Hess catalogue.

Trashball 011308: The Old Days

Either a very early and to-the-point personals ad or an employment artifact from back in the day when women were called girls. Probably a little bit of both, really.

Painting of the Day: "Louis-François Bertin" by Ingres

Stunning.

Devious, Truculent and Unreliable

Well, for any Morrissey fans out there, this is rather old news, but I just read his full statement on True to You in re his writs against NME for falsely painting him as a racist. He writes, "I had no reason whatsoever to assume that [NME] could be anything other than devious, truculent and unreliable. In the event, they have proven to be all three."

What I relish about this minor kerfluffle is that those are the exact words a high-court judge used to describe Morrissey in an earlier, Smiths-related case.

Trashball 011208: El Dragon Infernal

Found this Mexican Kung-Fu movie poster/lobby card for a mere $3.00 at the local junk shop.

Often Asked, Seldom Answered

I decree today that life
Is simply taking and not giving

England is mine and it owes me a living

Ask me why, and i'll spit in your eye

Oh, ask me why, and i'll spit in your eye

But we cannot cling to the old dreams anymore

No, we cannot cling to those dreams

Does the body rule the mind

Or does the mind rule the body?

I dunno...

Under the iron bridge we kissed

And although i ended up with sore lips

It just wasn't like the old days anymore

No, it wasn't like those days

Am i still ill?

Oh ...Am i still ill?

Does the body rule the mind

Or does the mind rule the body?

I dunno...

Ask me why, and i'll die

Oh, ask me why, and i'll die

And if you must go to work tomorrow

Well, if i were you i really wouldn't bother

For there are brighter sides to life

And i should know, because i've seen them

But not often ...

Under the iron bridge we kissed

And although i ended up with sore lips

It just wasn't like the old days anymore

No, it wasn't like those days

Am i still ill?

Oh ...Oh, am i still ill?

Lyrics/music by Morrissey & Marr

The Smiths

Patent Pending

I found this superb poem by Hugo Williams in the Feb. 2008 issue of Harper's.

Old Motel Postcards

Well, I decided I must liquidate my 1500+ collection of fabulous old motel postcards, including the Skyliner Motel of Concordia, Kansas, and the Baker Hill Motor Court of Bowling Green, Kentucky. If you dig this kind of stuff, check them out here as I s-l-o-w-l-y list them.

Personal Trashball

I've been rummaging through boxes for crap to sell on eBay lately and it's been nothing if not a Proustian exercise. Among some of my effects, I found these three items. First is a sticker I designed for a campaign we at PETA were working on during the summer of 1988 (I think) to ban the carriage-horse trade. That was a long, hot summer, and we spent every day on the National Mall videotaping and taking notes of the horses' condition.

Next is a picture from circa 1992 of my brother Mike, looking suitably impressed by what must be either the worst or best wallpaper ever designed, manufactured, and installed. This was in a remote Canadian village somewhere, on our way to a fishing trip. (Yes, by this time, I was no longer affiliated with PETA.)

And here is a shot of the shadows cast during a partial solar eclipse sometime while I was in college, probably around 1993. The ten minutes or so it lasted were sublime. The light and air were honeyed and the best place to look was at the ground, where the leaves in the trees cast these amazing elliptical shadows.

Trashball 010608: What Is This Man Doing?

Can anybody out there tell me what this man is doing? What is that machine, and why is he wearing headphones? Is it simply an early switchboard? A prototype Bose stereo? Is it an old picture of Steve Jobs? I'm keen to know the answer, so please use the comments section if you can suss it out.

Trashball 010608: Lui Fa una Bella Figura

I don't know who this guy is, but I like the cut of his jib.

Oh wait, I just looked at the back of the photo. It reads: "Souvenir of your student Federico on the river-boat along the Seine, Paris August 1960."

Trashball 010608: Highland Pot Roast

Email me if you want the recipe, just make sure you've got plenty of rump beef and catsup. That's right, I spelled it catsup.

Trashball 010608: A Most Dubious "Recipe"

Presented for your gustatory pleasure, a "recipe" for Hamburgers with Cheez Whiz from a circa 1960 Kraft Foods mailer. Uh, does this really qualify as a recipe? Seems pretty darn straightforward to me. Further on in the mailer, there's a recipe for boiling water. Okay, not really, but still.

Trashball 010608: Drink Ticket Talisman

So, among my Trashball stock, I came across this 1982 drink coupon from the 9:30 Club, which was very important to the development of the famous DC punk scene. After extensive research (okay, about 15 minutes) online, I was unable to find out who played on the night of September 2, 1982. But around this time you could regularly see acts like Bad Brains, Minor Threat, and I discovered that young REM played a gig there in November '82.

Book of the Day: Heavy Water

Heavy Water, by Martin Amis. Amis is my favorite writer, which makes it all the funnier that the inscription by my friend Nicola, who bought the 1st edition for me in the UK (and which was later signed by Amis himself), reads, "Much as it galls me to buy a book by Shorty, I hope you like it." Like it? I love it! Thanks again, Mistress.

Virgie

"Virgie", Goodwin painting for sale. 24 x 18", acrylic and flame on canvas. $203. Click on price to buy.

Jesusmouth!

Pat Boone
Mother Teresa

Jim Bakker

I'm working on a (growing) suite of rusty cans featuring the mouths of evangelicals and other so-called Christians. My source material is a stack of circa 1980 religion magazines and rusty steel cans dating as far back as the 1950s. Here are three so far.

Friday Cat Blog: A Tribute to Milo

Poor dear old Milo has had a challenging life. For 9 years, friends and strangers alike have heaped scorn upon him, for his Harvey-Keitel-in-Bad-Lieutenant barrel belly; for his unfortunate inability to stop drooling; for his little ratty tail; for his frequent hairballing; for his gas-passing; for his runny right eyeball; for his coarse, dandruffy hair; and—most especially—for the dead little toe on his left rear paw that looks like a dried-up black bean. But the other day I found him in an utter zen state. The photo catches a split second of what turned out to be 30 minutes of immobile dignity. He seemed, at last, to be at peace. (I eventually checked to see that he was still breathing. He was.)

Trashball 010408: Question for a Napkin

Cathy and Doron, I have a question for you. First off, after more than 14 years, are you still together? Odds are 50-50, I suppose. And if you're not, what's left besides napkins and recrimination and regret? Do you still love each other? I devoutly hope so. If you are still together, how did you do it?

The Letterman Beard

Man oh man. Since 1982 I've been watching—with varying degrees of loyalty—David Letterman. But I just cannot wrap my mind around the idea of his beard. He puts the weird in beard.

Trashball 010308: She's Got Helen Eyes

I have many photos of this woman. In each, she casts a skeptical eye to the camera, just as she does in this one. Where is she? Morocco? (She's the one at far right)