(Friday) Crab Blogging

I think that this is my all time favorite.


Note the worry lines. Crabs should worry.

Not a bad representation, though I don't wear my pants around my knees. On the other hand, I think I've been left out in the cold.

The Saga of the Mighty Wurlitzer

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I used to think, erroneously as it turns out, that political change happens insidiously. In a way, this is true. It happens person by person. But where I was in error is that the cause of this change is subtle. It is not. It is battered into people day after day until, one day, that person wakes up and actually believes something that the day before they did not. In spite of Goodwin, and with no mention of Mr. H., this must have been what happened to the German people in the 1930's and, ironically, the Israeli people in the last 60 years. If you have it beaten into your head, over and over again, that some people (Jews, Palestinians) or some person (Obama) are not what you thought them to be (ordinary people), eventually, to retain your sanity (not hold two opposing thoughts at one time), you will be led to believe the awful awful.

The American people have had hammered into their heads day after day that Obama is not "one of us," that he was born "elsewhere," that he is in some way "evil." So that now:

Poll: Growing number incorrectly call Obama Muslim

Why Muslim? Well, of course, to tie him in a salacious way with the opposition to the building of a mosque near Ground Zero (I am old enough to think of Ground Zero as the site of the first Atomic Bomb Test in New Mexico.)

(I have a picture that I took of this but I copped this one from the Internet)

This is going to have disastrous results on the American polity. The reasons for it are very simple. No better example is Sarah Palin abandoning her position of Governor of Alaska for the lucrative role of player of the Wurlitzer.

The suffering of Jews in Europe in the 1930's-'40's is well know. The dehumanization of Palestinians is ongoing. The killing of Afghan and Pakistani civilians (and consequent dehumanization) has led directly to the poor response to the Pakistani flood.

Propaganda is a powerful tool.

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Friday Crab Blogging

Composition, Composition. It can be everything.



I am not sure why the fish is on the sand.

Sunday Crab BackBlogging

I have been remiss in posting crabs in spite of a backlog of critters. But first, we must give kudos to an outstanding artist, Emma Dibben, whose portraiture of certain denizens of the South Coast is exquisite (as is much else that she draws):

FELIX?

Now to some other entries:

Mac is waxing poetic as in here:

Here with a little Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse—and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness—
Oh, Wilderness were Paradise enow!

Vertigo

In response to my last bit of snark, Professor F. has referred me to Acerone's most recent posting. These interesting street photos (reminiscent of the street photos of Garry Winograd that Unreal Nature takes such delight in), are all taken on basically the same slant except one of a young lady. But she has a coat belt hanging at the same slant as does a building roofline in the background, so the theme is persistent. Here is another of those slanted photos (presented for the purpose of commentary, I hope Acerone does not mind):

What this photo does to me, and maybe that is intentional, is throw off my balance. If you will, my semicircular canals are put at a slant, as so:

If one rights the picture:

The canals are brought back to upright:

And a further modification further decreases the sense of imbalance.

Now I am not suggesting for a moment that Acerone's pictures drive me wild as did the cockeyed one out of Matisse's studio window. Acerone's photographs are done with intent, and they certainly achieve a sense of unsettledness with me (but I am unsure if this his his/her attention.)

The inner ear is a fascinating organ. It is almost as complicated as the eye. The hair cells (in both the cochlea and the semicircular canals) are sensitive to movement down to as low as one Angstrom. Bending the "hair" opens channels for, among other things: SODIUM IONS. You see, you can't get away from it.

Another point of view

In an interesting post over at Unreal Nature, there are comments about paintings which then, as is usual in art and music, at a later date turn out to be 180 degrees out of sync with what comes to be established opinion (I am certain that there are artists where opinions sway back again to ground zero or, perhaps, 42 degrees, anyway.) What struck me was the comment "lopsided". This referred to Matisse's rather avant garde painting of Notre Dame, but I was struck by its applicability to the photo out of Matisse's studio window, the scenario for the paintings. It drives me wild when people print photos crooked. (I know, I know, I am a Neanderthal). In any case, I took the liberty of photoshopping that particular photo simply by righting it (2) and cropping it (3). To my eye it is much more pleasing and doesn't make me think that I am going to topple off the edge of the planet, thankfully not into the Seine.

Useful Information

Friday Crab Blogging

The Bear in the Woods

From here:

Friday Crab Blogging

Friday Crab Blogging

By order of her Majesty the Queen of the

Rappahannock

Rapidan.
The glorious Carrier of Water for diverse Philosophers of visual imaging. And Sundry Cheeses (big and otherwise):