MacDries says, "Now stop asking silly questions and sign on the crooked dotted line."
Last Day In Country
Think I'll take it easy today. Tired of working.
Rain's coming again tomorrow.
DVD Viewing
Night before last. Ocean's 12 Piece O'Crap. Slick, incomprehensible, boring.
Last night. Finding Neverland Beautiful, tender, un-pretentious, extremely well-acted top to bottom. Emma is wrong. She would like it.

MacDries says, "We know Johnny. Even the jurors who acquited him knew."
And The Truly Beautiful
Universe does Giacometti.
Behold The Beautiful
People Mag posted their 50 most beautuful people and I'm not one of them. Neither are you. But here's the surprise; most of them are actors and actresses.
April Showers
Getting a little tired of those. Even saw a couple snowflakes a couple days ago. Bought some Barley Straw for the pond. They claim it retards the growth of algae. We'll see even though we don't yet have any algae.
It's the same stuff they make Scotch Whiskey from; how bad can it be.

MacDries says, "Benny, Benny, don't you know it's a sin to lie."
Best News In Ages
A full hour of new music by our Guru Monk and Coltrane recorded at Carnegie Hall has been found by the Library of Congress. Go HERE.
Prior to this we only had about 3 studio tracks ("Coltrane, Coltrane") and a horribly recorded live session at the 5 Spot. Also new stuff Dizzy, Ray, Zoot Sims with Chet Baker and Rollins.
Plus tomorrow we get the new Bruce.
Tree Guys Are Here
Gotta get busy watching them work. That's what I'm paying them for.
That was fun watching them fell a dead 40 footer leaning toward my electric lines. They marked a line where they wanted it to fall, roped it, "cut the pie", then cut the back, the guy on the rope leaned back a bit as it wavered and "timber", smack on the line, five feet west of my wires.
Then they sliced all three trees into 16" chunks to dry and be split for the fireplace next winter.
Plus they hauled away all the twigs and small branches.
Kewl.

MacDries says, "Tell him what y'all think about stuff like Right To Choose, Pedophilia, Equal Rights For Women..."
Up Country
Up at 5:30 to take K&E to Newark Airport on way to LaLa Land and road trip up the coast to look at schools for Kate. Then I hop the bus to Penn Station to catch the 9:45 Amtrak to Hudson. Surprisingly, everything went smoothly and now I'm on modem for the week.
Re-seeded a bit of grass and met our new tenants in the apartment. Success. Nice young couple. He just opened a computer business and does web design and she's a novelist half-way through her first.
Raining here off and on but who cares. Everything is green, flowers are coming up all over.
Went to Agway and bought a Forsythia. Spent an hour digging a one foot hole in this rocky hardscrabble clay. Filled it with some good soil and plopped the sucker in. Not sure if it will take or not.
Keep your damn mid-western snow to your self. You folks like it or you'd move.

Pullover (If you could call it that. It looked more like a rag.)
drenched
Remnants of a way back Christmas
(There's still pine needles in his hair.)

Surprised
by an early rainstorm
out with the tree (If you could call it that. It was more like a branch.)
A certain smell
left lingering round his hair
(Must have been that scented shampoo.)

Waiting (what for?)
lost in his own shoes. (If you could call them that. They were more like socks.)
Shrinking under the awning
(The pizza place opened last Friday.)

I walked past him
I knew I should've stopped
But I was late for work (If you can call answering phones all day, work.)
I looked back
(He was watching me.)

MacDries says, "Sounds appropriatly Monkish to me, "Let's Call This".
Go HERE for more of Emma's poetry.
OK
We're up in the morning at 5:30 to catch a car to Newark where the girls fly on to LaLaLand and I catch a bus to Penn Station to catch an Amtrak train to Hudson where I'll get in my Jeep for a week of modem time. Deal with it! I'm totally kewl. Blogging will be more sporadic for a while.
Gonna chop down a couple dead trees, rake some lawn, plant a Forsythia amidst the Lilacs (yellow/lavender complementary) and "clear some bush/brush".
And try to find some Goldfish for the pond. Also want to plant a White Birch or two. Always loved them. Don't know why.
Dick Waving A Whole Bunch Of Flags
Drape yourself in as many flags as you need, Dickie, you're still a teeny-tiny fascist pig compared to Mussolini who got his dickie-self hung upside down with his dickie stuffed in his mouth.
Willie's Contract

MacDries says, "On a separate page there is a clause stipulating 10 grand cash. This would be no doubt be Willie's stash for personal items, such as blowback buds of Columbian or Jamaican Gold. Jog in the morning and kick back before show time. I've always thought the ideal "job" (if one had to have one) would be roadie for Willie & Family.
Old Blue Eyes
Frank Sinatra was arrested by the Bergen County, New Jersey sheriff in 1938 and charged with carrying on with a married woman (yes, you could get popped for that back then). The charge was later changed to adultery, and eventually dismissed.
Go HERE for more.
Quote From Another Day
The only "ism" hollywood believes in is plagiarism.
- Dorothy Parker

MacDries says, "She also said, 'I've been too f...... busy and vice versa.' and many more funny/true things. Such as: 'If you laid all Yale co-eds end to end, I wouldn't be surprised.'"
For Emma
One cute swimmer to another.
NYTimes Loves Chuck Close
Hardly a month goes by without an article or some mention of Chuck Close. Today's entry tells us that his long time friend Phillip Glass has composed a musical portrait of him as payback for the countless portraits Close has recycled from a 1969 photo. I won't waste my server space showing it here. You've all seen it.

MacDries wants to know, "Who cares? A musical "portrait"? Gimme a break."
Doh! Of The Day
Headline: Bush Says Politics Stalling Bolton Vote.

MacDries says, "Advise & Consent. Ever heard of it?"
Young Dorothy
Nice sepia, no?
Every Day Is Earth Day

MacDries gives it a few months.
Remember David Stone Martin?
Go HERE for lots of old album covers (repeat).
Benny 16 Says:
You can email me: benedictxvi@vatican.va

MacDries says, "I sent Benny a welcome email with a pic of VanEyck's Ghent alterpiece. I'm gonna tell Emma to see if he'll join her iChat Buddy List."
Deadman's Humor
Convicted murderer, Douglas Roberts, 42, was upbeat and animated in the seconds before the lethal drugs were administered.
"I've been hanging around this popsicle stand way too long," he said. "When I die, bury me deep, lay two speakers at my feet, put some headphones on my head and rock 'n' roll me when I'm dead."
"I'll see you in heaven some day," he added.
At his trial, Roberts told his attorney to call no defense witnesses and pick a jury that favored the death penalty.

MacDries says, "Make that 13 votes for the death penalty."
Plumber's Humor

MacDries says, "It's about 30 years too late to keep Arnie out."
Latest Craze


Carl sent these and a few more. Don't even think about it Kate, Emma.
Benny 16 Says:
"In the Church, priests also are sinners. But I am personally convinced that the constant presence in the press of the sins of Catholic priests, especially in the United States, is a planned campaign, as the percentage of these offenses among priests is not higher than in other categories, and perhaps it is even lower."
And:
"Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered to an intrinsic moral evil, and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder."

MacDries says, "Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. Higher than, say, the Boy Scouts."
Brooklyn-1966

©1966 Danny Dries

MacDries says, "Kill all Pit Bulls and their trainers and let God sort them out."
Got Nuthin' Today
I know, a nap!

MacDries says, "This was intended as a tribute and I'd have to agree."
Go HERE for story.
Get Your Own Before The Governator Teminates Them
GirlyMan Schwarzenegger.
Who Could Disagree?
"I don't know about you, but the hug between the mom from Pflugerville, Texas whose son died on the battlefield and the woman whose dad had been -- Saddam Hussein had ordered her dad's assassination, human rights activist inside of Iraq, who voted and flew over to represent her country in Laura's box."
-George W. Bush

MacDries says, "Finish the fucking sentence Shrub!!!!!!!!
Heeeeere's Mark
Go HERE.
Gonzo Poetry
"So now, less than five (35) years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look west, and with the right kind of eyes, you can almost see the high-water mark - that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back."
-Hunter Thompson

You know, I spent a fortune on deodorant before I realized that people didn't like me anyway.

I was thinking that women should put pictures of missing husbands on beer cans!

I was thinking about old age and decided that it is 'when you still have something on the ball, but you are just too tired to bounce it'.

I thought about making a fitness movie, for folks my age, and call it "Pumping Rust."

I have gotten that dreaded furniture disease. That's when your chest is falling into your drawers!

I know, when people see a cat's litter box, they always say, "Oh, have you got a cat?" Just once I want to say, "No, it's for company!"

Employment application blanks always ask 'who is to be notified in case of an emergency.' I think you should write, "A Good Doctor!"

Why do they put pictures of criminals up in the Post Office? What are we supposed to do -- write to these men? Why don't they just put their pictures on the postage stamps so the mailmen could look for them while they deliver the mail?

I was thinking about how people seem to read the Bible a whole lot more as they get older. Then, it dawned on me, they were cramming for their finals. As for me, I'm just hoping God grades on the curve.
Bad Education
New film by Almodovar, rent it. Amazing as usual from the best filmaker working today.
Doing a bit of (house) painting today, then more leaves. Getting tired of raking all these leaves. Think I'll leave most of them.

MacDries says, "I also knew Richard Estes and Damien Hirst is no Richard Estes."
Proud Creature
When I was younger,
fear didn't mean anything to me.
All I saw was kindness,
etched in your soft brown eyes,
like autumn leaves
that you stomp on taking me on my first ride.
I'm sorry you shied and bucked
I'm sorry I fell.
Wild creature - I know you're sorry.
Gentle creature - I know you're shocked.
Proud creature - don't ever die.
Can't imagine the tearful departure.
Too young - why would they do that?
I won't watch you take that plunge.
I want you to stay in that stance,
displaying that strong back
that so comfortably supports me.
Nervous.
Excited
Around the ring.
First canter - first jump.
A wrestler and I
fight for the title.
You're my partner, my sidekick.
No turning back.
Go for it.
Hear me whisper to you?
Flying,
You don't let me back away,
You don't let me fall.
Racing mind - sweaty hands
grip the reins,
like gripping laughter
you so comfortably ease me in to.
You seem so relaxed,
but I sense the tension.
I know what you want.
You want to fly.
Not like the robin,
who crashed into our window yesterday.
But like the cheetah,
the greyhound,
the gazelle.
You want to be one with the earth,
be free under endless
blue sky.
I want it, too.
No one else understands
what we want;
why we want it.
But keep that hope inside,
a spark of possibility.
We could be flying
like the cheetah,
the greyhound,
the gazelle.
We could fly,
and never stop,
and never die.
Proud creature - don't ever die.

- Emma Dries 4/7/05
Go HERE for more of Emma's poetry.
The Record
Yesterday over 100 people visited this WebLog. That's a record so far.

MacDries says, "I want a percentage of this and any interested parties can contact me and I'll negotiate with my lil' sis."
Overheard
Woman: How did you get that big scar on your face?
Man: The war in Iraq.
Woman: That's still going on?
--42nd & Lexington
Go HERE for more.
Commentary
My eldest daughter Gretchen suggested I should have a place for visitors to comment on this WebLog. Well, I don't know how to do that without putting an email link and then those nasty search worms would record it and I'd get tons of spam. However, if anyone wants to comment by emailing me at the address logo above, I will compile and publish a log of your screeds verbatim; both effusive praise and critical diatribes.
No New Art
Working on a largish painting at the moment which takes a bit more time. That's my excuse. Here's an older one.
Ann claimed this one.
Gut Buster Of The Day
Charles & Camilla's Plea Bargain:
"We acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickedness, Which we, from time to time, most grievously have committed, by thought, word and deed, Against thy Divine Majesty, Provoking most justly thy wrath and indignation against us."

Macdries says, "What! No mention of toe-sucking? Now that ought to be a sin if it isn't. But maybe it's only wicked."
It's Not All B&W
Electing a new Pope can get tricky. After each vote -- there are to be two per day -- the ballots are burned, with the smoke rising into a Vatican chimney. Black smoke means no decision was reached; white signals a new pontiff has been chosen.
John Paul II changed the rules to require that the basilica's bells also ring to announce a new pope. In the past, there has been confusion because the white smoke can sometimes appear gray.

MacDries says, "That's because sometimes the old geezers make a bad choice.
Hands On Creativity Center

Our friend Carol Wright runs this place in Sioux Falls, SD. It's at 8th & Railroad Center. Stop in when you're in that part of the great plains.
There are great artists outside of NYC.
Couple Of The Recent Retired
South Dakota style.

* In the event I lapse into a persistent vegetative state, I want medical authorities to resort to extraordinary means to prolong my hellish semiexistence. Fifteen years wouldn't be long enough for me.
* I want my wife and my parents to compound their misery by engaging in a bitter and protracted feud that depletes their emotions and their bank accounts.
* I want my wife to ruin the rest of her life by maintaining an interminable vigil at my bedside. I'd be really jealous if she waited less than a decade to start dating again or otherwise rebuilding a semblance of a normal life.
* I want my case to be turned into a circus by losers and crackpots from around the country who hope to bring meaning to their empty lives by investing the same transient emotion in me that they once reserved for Laci Peterson, Chandra Levy and that little girl who got stuck in a well.
* I want those crackpots to spread vicious lies about my wife.
* I want to be placed in a hospice where protesters can gather to bring further grief and disruption to the lives of dozens of dying patients and families whose stories are sadder than my own.
* I want the people who attach themselves to my case because of their deep devotion to the sanctity of life to make death threats against any judges, elected officials or health care professionals who disagree with them.
* I want the medical geniuses and philosopher kings who populate the Florida Legislature to ignore me for more than a decade and then turn my case into a forum for weeks of politically calculated bloviation.
* I want total strangers - oily politicians, maudlin news anchors, ersatz friars and all other hangers-on - to start calling me "Bobby," as if they had known me since childhood.
* I'm not insisting on this as part of my directive, but it would be nice if Congress passed a "Bobby's Law" that applied only to me and ignored the medical needs of tens of millions of other Americans without adequate health coverage.
* Even if the "Bobby's Law" idea doesn't work out, I want Congress - especially all those self-described conservatives who claim to believe in "less government and more freedom" - to trample on the decisions of doctors, judges and other experts who actually know something about my case. And I want members of Congress to launch into an extended debate that gives them another excuse to avoid pesky issues such as national security and the economy.
* In particular, I want House Majority Leader Tom DeLay to use my case as an opportunity to divert the country's attention from the mounting political and legal troubles stemming from his slimy misbehavior.
* And I want Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to make a mockery of his Harvard medical degree by misrepresenting the details of my case in ways that might give a boost to his 2008 presidential campaign.
* I want Frist and the rest of the world to judge my medical condition on the basis of a snippet of dated and demeaning videotape that should have remained private.
* Because I think I would retain my sense of humor even in a persistent vegetative state, I'd want President Bush - the same guy who publicly mocked Karla Faye Tucker when signing off on her death warrant as governor of Texas - to claim he was intervening in my case because it is always best "to err on the side of life."
* I want the state Department of Children and Families to step in at the last moment to take responsibility for my well-being, because nothing bad could ever happen to anyone under DCF's care.
* And because Gov. Jeb Bush is the smartest and most righteous human being on the face of the Earth, I want any and all of the aforementioned directives to be disregarded if the governor happens to disagree with them. If he says he knows what's best for me, I won't be in any position to argue.

Robert Friedman is editor of Perspective.
My Pope Stories

1. I was working a painting job on Mercer Street with two Jewish guys the day JP-2 first came to New York. At lunch time both these guys ran around the corner to Broadway to catch il Papa pass by in his Pope Mobile. I smoked a joint and had a quiet lunch and quick nap on the floor alone. Couldn't have cared less.

2. However, previously, in 1966, I did go down the hill to St. Peter's to watch LBJ land in his huge black helicopter to visit John-23 on his way back from Vietnam. JBJ, stuck in big muddy, wasn't particulary loved at the time and was hoping some of 23's popularity would rub off.

3. We also went down one Sunday to watch il Papa roll his rug out of his apartment window and give his weekly speech. Peter Smith developed an impersonation and would roll his Persian rug out his studio window on the 3rd floor of the Amercian Adademy In Rome every Sunday for weeks thereafter. And one Easter we went to mass in the plaza. May have been the last time I went to mass.

4. Sometime in 1957 I was parking my cherry black 4-door 47 Plymouth (with grey pin-stripe flannel seats) at a house in Sheldon, Iowa where my first love was babysitting. I was planning a little slap & tickle when I heard on the radio that Pius-12 (the one they say was a secret Nazi and the only one I had known in 16 years) had died. My girlfriend Leah, the daughter of a mortician, was Bethel Reformed so she didn't give a damn and it didn't put a total damper on my plans but I felt a little disrespectful.

MacDries wonders what the applause represents?
il Papa
The first section of the New York Times was half-filled with articles on the Pope, the death of the Pope, the succession of the Pope and peoples reaction to the death of the Pope. Wonder what they would have used for filler if he hadn't shuffled off his mortal coil.

MacDries says, "I don't understand how anyone can take this all seriously. Vera Drake was more angelic than any Pope and she was just a character in fiction. I feel alien to this whole consciousness.

Back at'cha Shrub. You little twerp!
Go HERE to see the whole tape.

For The Latest Dries Art GO HERE
For The Latest CyberToonz GO HERE
I've never actually watched an episode of The Simpsons (I'm more of a Pixar kind of guy) butt...
*Dislaimer

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