Please go read Cindy Sheehan's message today at michaelmoore.com:

Three active duty soldiers from Ft. Hood came to visit me and tell me that they really appreciated what I was doing and that if they were killed in the war, their moms would be doing the same thing. That made me feel so good after all of the negativity I had been hearing from the righties. I also got to hold a couple of toddlers on my lap while their mom or dad took pictures of us. I am honored that people have resonated with the action that I took to make our mission of ending the war a reality.

Every day she gets more powerful, more confident, and more determined. We're with you, Cindy!

I'm off to New Orleans. Hopefully I'll have a chance to blog from there.

Take care everyone --

Here's Inu on the floor of my room at Fred and Selma's. "Inu" is Japanese for "dog", which is a far more meaningful name than most, I suppose, since she is in fact a Japanese dog. Her Akita half is strong. She is a true samurai dog. One afternoon I walked her up the hill as I always did, and on the way back down, past the first curve and then the second, she suddenly stopped and went down into that expectant Sphynx-like pose dogs do on command. A few seconds later a man came running up the hill with his Jack Russell terrier, huffing and puffing from the arduous trip up. Once they were in sight, Inu stood up, seemed to grow exponentially, and hardened herself, pointing her entire body directly at them.

It was impressive and reminded me of the stories my karate instructor would tell me about the disguise of midieval samurai: hidden beneath an old woman's cloak would be his sword and dagger; the cloak draped over his head to shadow his face; his shoulders stooped and rounded, giving the impression that he was a damaged, elderly woman going home from the market. When he was approached and challenged, though, he would emerge, cast off his robe, and brandish his sword. He appeared to grow giant before his opponent's eyes.

Seeing Inu crouch into posture then promptly make herself erect, I wondered if the samurai took their cues from the Akitas around them, learning to hide their strength under cloaks as the dogs hid their strength in their postures, only to explode with power when the situation demanded it. It's a good strategy, don't you think? I'd say Cindy Sheehan knows it's a good strategy too.


I couldn't resist stopping to take a picture of this advertisement. Across LA are hand-painted signs like this one with pieces of clothing that seem to be both full and empty at the same time. They have the bulk they would have if a person were in them, but there is no body, no person. How odd! This one had a bible verse from the Book of John beneath it. Only "Free Indeed" is visible in the picture. Using the bible to sell stuff is nothing new, I know, but it seems to be more ubiquitous these days on the streets of major cities. Is it just me or is everyone noticing this? The car wash down the street from my friend Lisa's house doesn't have the verse spelled out like this ad here; instead there are only the book names and verse numbers, Matthew 3:16, etc. etc., beneath their yellow and red signs for Tuesday specials and detailing prices.


My friend Lisa took this picture on our walk back to the car from the Jean-Michel Basquiat show at MOCA. She pointed to the tree and said "That's a Basquiat tree!" I had to agree, so I asked her to take my picture next to it to send to S. Basquiat is a frustrating artist to love: his work is magnificent, challenging, yet he was overtaken by addiction and overdosed at 27. What a waste. Imagine what kind of art he would be producing today in his 40s if only he had lived.

Kevin Young, an American poet, wrote a book about Basquiat that is, well, outstanding. It is called To Repel Ghosts and it is a collection of poems based on Basquiat's work and life, often using the words Basquiat scrawled on his paintings and the sides of NYC buildings. Basquiat was as much a poet as a painter. "To Repel Ghosts" was in the MOCA show, the words painted across a beat-up piece of wood that appeared to be an old door. It may have been; scavengers and collectors scoured the city after he became famous, stripping his SAMO markings by removing the entire door or section of wall. Some of these stripped pieces were in the show, though I admit I thought that was too bad, that they should have been left out in the world as Basquiat/SAMO intended.

He was, on one level, committed to public art and made fun of our ideas of private art and copyright by putting copyright symbols next to phrases and ideas in his work. He was also committed to exposing the truths about colonization, slavery, and racism in his paintings. Some of the pieces deconstruct our notions of history while simultaneously tearing apart our ideas of art. How brilliant!


Here's a picture of my honey, because I miss him. I took this outside our hotel in Indianapolis a year and a half ago, after his unit's Christmas party back when we thought he was out of the military. That's another story. He always hated that I took his picture so much, but I'm glad I ignored his admonitions. I need these pictures now. I love them. I even love the ones where he looks annoyed at me for taking his picture. We talked this morning and it made me nearly ecstatic. It was so good to hear his voice. He could have read the Ranger manual to me and I would have been happy. Words words words, heard in my S's voice. That would have been enough.