MY LIBRARY

I don't read much at all. It's not that I don't have the time but I might not have the patience. In school, growing up, I would let every other classmate answer review questions about the chapter we were to have read the night before. I'd found a way to turn avoiding homework and class participation into an art form. I literally read maybe 20 lines from A Separate Peace and possibly a total of a chapters worth of The Great Gatsby and somehow managed to get Bs on both tests. Don't get me wrong, I am very literate and enjoy writing and appreciate good writers and understand how difficult it is to produce good writings, but I always had an internal monologue reminding me to not get involved with the reading part. Becoming familiar with an author's style always seemed intimidating to me and the 'good' ones usually have a lot of work out there. I couldn't allow myself to sort out the inner-workings of this strangers mind. A relationship perhaps too intimate would form between me and the author and this would surely be a burden to my sanity. Being assigned reading in school also made it seem like work. There was a thin line between a textbook and a novel and the two often teamed up to potentially ruin a sunny afternoon of fun.

Around 1990 I found Calvin and Hobbes. Bill Watterson's comic strip found a way to slip through all of those barriers I put up in my brain, my stubborn attempts to resist the influence of an author. Everything about it fit into my life like clockwork. The artwork itself became more and more refined as the years went by. It "matured" along with me into my teens. The kid and his tiger would literally poise themselves atop higher and higher precipices while expressing perfect observations of life before plunging down the treacherous hills in their little red wagon. We have all faced those moments of much needed clarity in peace and in chaos. Calvin seemed to dislike schoolwork and we frequently found him daydreaming in and out of class. How could I not relate? Hobbes, on the other hand, was Calvin's voice of reason and kept all of us grounded a bit in reality. It was all there in Calvin and Hobbes. I was there in Calvin and Hobbes! These days I often mention that I learned everything I need to know from that strip. Calvin and Hobbes was my textbooks and it's my collection of novels. Bill Watterson retired the strip on December 31st 1995 and sent me off into the world bestowed with this unique knowledge and perception of the entire universe to use at my disposal. Face it... Gatsby wasn't nearly as great.

MULTIPLE PERSONALITIES PT.1

As mentioned in the first C.O.P. blog post, I consider myself to be a shapeshifter of sorts. My interest in activities, art, people, and personal style changes from year to year if not minute by minute. Sometimes my interests are recycled and sometimes I uncover something entirely new.

For part one of this ADD-ridden flux, I will start with exposing you to the Scratch DJ. I would have to say my interest in Hip Hop drifted solely to the DJ in 1995 when a lot of amazing things were happening with DJ crews in the San Francisco Bay area (Invisibl Skratch Piklz, Bullet Proof Scratch Hamsters), on the East coast in New York (X-ecutioners), and in the U.K. (Scratch Perverts) that were grabbing my attention throughout the '90s. Q-Bert, Mix Master Mike, Short Kut, Apollo, Yoga Frog, D-Styles, Disk, Flare, and A-Trak make up the Skratch Piklz and they reigned in the '90s. Their skills influenced- and intimidated- other DJs to such a degree that Q-Bert and Mix Master Mike were asked to no longer participate in the DMC championships in order to give other DJs a fair chance at winning, granting them legendary God-like status. Meanwhile another DJ crew, The Bullet Proof Scratch Hamsters, harbored one of my personal favorite DJs/producers Eddie Def. Eddie Def and his crew developed the first ever battle record Hamster Breaks vol. 1. Each track on Hamster Breaks vol. 1 was crafted to include continuous sampled words and phrases or looped beats intended for scratching and beat juggling. Eddie's style was a little sloppy and care free and he went on to produce a huge amount of solo drum machine driven projects. In the early '00s it seemed like 3 Eddie Def albums came out per year for a few years straight. Some of his output was lo-fi, minimal or even unfinished sounding, but I admired his aim and overall he influenced much of the early beat driven music I ended up making on my computer. There is something about scratching records that goes far beyond that abrasive back and forth 'wikky-wikky' sound everyone is familiar with. There are infinite sounds and techniques, and as seen in some of the videos below, an innovative DJ must have a mind that understands sonic architecture and complex combinations of patterns. I'll let these clips of scratch DJing at its finest speak for themselves. Oh yeah, and that DJ Swamp routine is one of the best routines ever!

LEERIX

She says, "Go! Be careful what you catch-

You'll have to eat it next, and you can't take the taste of game."

and I say, "No! I'll drag it through your door-

I'll leave it on the floor, just to pretend I can't be tamed."

~Andrew Graham - from the song Take it Easy on Kathy at Least She Can Dance

LATENT ASSASSIN

Almost every morning I wake up and my mind does a quick review of what just happened. Most of the dreams are already forgotten, and the ones that linger read like fortune cookies written in broken English. I roll over. Now I think about the night before. Sometimes I'm relieved to know I stayed in, saved some cash, and that surplus of energies should allow my morning to run a little more smoothly. Sometimes I can immediately feel the old almost worthless alcohol buzz oozing off me, and I wonder why I wasted so much energy just to have a conversation with a friend. Regardless; I've now been reset. I have a day ahead of me and an impending evening wrought with simple models of moral circumstance. Still in bed, I'm almost paralyzed with the task of sorting out my persistant past, present, and future. It's such a sloppy process that I almost feel completely new. I might as well be three years old learning the days of the week for the first time. Today(Wednesday) I recognize just how vulnerable I am when resetting. Throughout an average day I demand my personal space, I spend my hard earned money, I make friends and strangers laugh with my polished wit, and I make sure I stand up straight and keep a close eye on my surroundings. Then all of that conscious effort vanishes and I sleep. My strength is gone. How much easier can I make it for my enemies to blot me out, I wonder, but even they let me sleep. Thank you, enemies. My Neighbors remembered to unplug their iron, so I didn't choke on the smoke of our block burning down. Thank you neighbors. My body kept me breathing and kept my cancers at a safe distance from my vital organs. Thanks automatic motor functions. A new day and I can already feel my strength returning. Everyone else seems charged as well. A delivery truck is idling, waiting for its driver and his empty dolly. Members of the local gym jog to the gym to jog in the gym. My roommates make their escapes to work. These are our attempts to assassinate the naked delicate person in our bed each night. The us who is lucky to be alive.

THE BIG BANG TASTES LIKE LIVER

I'm so tired of hearing about The Big Bang. I enjoy watching shows about science and technology, but every time the subject is The Big Bang, I feel like I'm forcing myself to taste liver for the 5th time. Have you ever tasted liver? I'm pretty sure I remember it tasting like cardboard marinated in mud. My mother would randomly order it if it was on the menu at a cheap restaurant. I would always take a bite of the liver, reassuring myself that it wasn't going to taste as bad as I remembered, but it always tasted awful. This is exactly how the Big Bang theory finds it's way into my head and rests in my gut, leaving my brain reeling with questions, regret, and a nasty aftertaste.

According to popular scientific theory; at the beginning of time, everything (and they mean EVERYTHING! even TIME!) was compressed into an infinitesimally small singularity. This singularity was not floating in space. Space was floating in it. Nothing was in existence at that point. The singularity barely even existed it was so tiny. Then, in an instant: The Big Bang. Within a trillionth of a millisecond the Universe was born and had doubled in size 100,000 times. Radiation, matter, gravity, and, yes, even time were all finally new. Within 10 billion years Earth began to form. 4.5 billion years after that and I'm typing about it. Sigh.

What makes us believe this? Well, in the early '20s American Astronomer Edwin Hubble looked out into space with his observatory's huge Hooker telescope and realized all the little blurs previously assumed to be clouds of gas, were in fact other galaxies. Galaxies neighboring our own Milky Way galaxy (the closest neighbor being 25,000 light years away). Moreover, this discovery led to other observational experiments that proved all of these celestial communities were moving rapidly away form one another. Being bitten by this theory left scientists and the public in a rabies-like frenzy. A thing once presumed wild was now wilder; falling apart even! We wanted an explanation before we hurtled out into abandonment. Quite simply the idea was put in reverse by Georges Lemaître and we could only conclude that everything was real close to one another in the 'beginning'. Logic and reason and science had provided for an interestingly unfathomable -- silencer.

Planck Satellite image of mapped microwave background radiation. AKA- The afterglow of the Big Bang.

So how big is the Universe anyway? Well we have certainly never known the answer to this question. In fact, before Hubble noticed those other millions of galaxies, our Milky Way galaxy was thought to be the near extent of the universe. An idea that seems quite foolish now to a person even of average intelligence. The Universe is relatively huge and potentially infinite. So how can mortal man assume it is expanding from one point? How are we sure that everything (in it's hugeness) is not still carving its way to some other point in some infinitely far corner of the universe to collect and collapse? This simple question is met with furious resistance most of the times I have ever brought it to light. I "...haven't taken enough classes..." or I, "...don't understand how physics works..." enough to dare propose such a theory. What's more interesting is that most people who have challenged me are atheists, or they at least put most of their faith in science over religion. What they don't realize is that they are supporting a theory of God. God was that moment right before the Big Bang. A voice too loud to hear had proclaimed "Let there be Light!" and there was light. Of course these people never read about God discussing the dissolving of radiation and the cooling of matter after all was put into action, so that doesn't dissuade them from being content with The Big Bang. If anything I'm typically Apathetic. I don't care enough to insist I'm right or you're wrong. I'm not too stubborn to admit when I'm wrong, but to not know exactly how huge the Universe is seems like a blaring signal to not take anything to be absolute. The rules of physics are distorted in nonsensical ways at a black hole's event horizon, so why is it not possible that physics can be altered in other areas of the unknown Universe? It is possible. Most people are just satisfied with the idea of nothing at the beginning. The Big Bang theory is simply buying us some time to make up for not knowing. Consider how science and understanding of our physical world has unfolded over the centuries. It is a very proud and clumsy process.

There was nothing at a calculable distance back in time from now? That theory is based on science, science is not based on that theory. Why? Because it might be wrong, mom. You don't have to order the liver.

OUR GROUNDED FUTURE

Why did I want flying cars so badly? I'm pretty sure everyone was certain we would have them by now, but why? Is flying a car really a symbol of advancing society? I guess some people reading this could care less about a flying car, but I was always looking forward to it. The concept seemed like fun in Back to the Future II. I have noticed that this laptop is cooler than I could have dreamed any flying car to be, and my model is a dinosaur already; an Apple G4 Powerbook circa 2004! It pretty much does what I need it to do and has suffered the need for only a few repairs including a new (and upgraded) hard drive, an upgrade of memory, and an occasional hammering out of dents. They don't make 'em like this anymore. Though as old as this laptop is, I don't think the reality of the technology it possesses has sunk in yet. When I stop and think about how easily I can find information by passing my hands over this machine, it's almost frightening. During my blind anticipation of the flying car, and in the waning of that interest, I don't think I saw this one coming.

The information age is upon us! Sure, I was warned about it in those early bizarre 'information superhighway' commercials 16 years ago. I never took it seriously I guess. Even when dial up became available in our home, it seemed like a passing trend. I remember being so excited to jump online when my dad was done working from home. I anxiously waited for web pages of my favorite bands to load at a snail's pace... waiting nervously as if the internet was going to 'go away' before I had a chance to get the exclusive information I needed.

Here it all is! Everything I could have wanted and more. Sometimes too much information is available. How do my cells even keep up? I don't remember installing any new software in my body, so how have I been able to adapt? It's very possible that I'm not adapting too well at all. Something so commonplace as switching on a light when entering a room has evolved into including the sights and sounds that millions of people have conjured and, like creating light with the light switch, the majority of us barely understand it beyond assuming it's some sort of magic. No questions asked or else I might ruin the trick. I suppose I might actually still be more comfortable with the flying car bit. I still kind of like the clunker of a concept that has some old fashioned character and will get me where I need to go at speeds far below that of light. Or maybe I just need to get out more.

MULESKINNER BLUES

Blue Yodel #8, written and recorded by Jimmie Rodgers in 1930, is the original version of what would be known as Muleskinner Blues. Muleskinner Blues saw many reinterpretations from then until now, but the version I've become most familiar with is The Fendermen's version from 1960. About 8 years ago I bought a '50s/'60s hits compilation record for a dollar from a thrift store. The record featured some obvious selections of 'Hop' styled chart-toppers of the era, but The Fendermen's Muleskinner Blues seemed to stick out like a sore thumb. Clearly the subject of the lyrics was derived from something I was not culturally familiar with, and possibly The Fendermen felt the same way, but they sang with such confidence to a point where they seem to lose control and the song's spirit takes over (note: near-insane laughter/yodeling adopted from Joe Gibson's 1959 version.)

An interesting quality of the particular version I own is the tracks tempo and grooves on the record are perfectly in sync, where if the needle skips forward or backward a loop is created. Sometimes the loop will find a rapid fire bass jangle and high pitched guitar flicker, or the loop may find a perpetually perfect, "he heee he he he heee- he heee he he he heee-". It's intriguing to the point were I've actually stood over the record for nearly a half hour manually guiding the needle from groove to groove, creating a 45 minute long version of Muleskinner Blues. I create a different version everytime I try it, and I'm always left smiling in my self-induced hypnosis. I like to think that I've contributed to the long line of reinterpretations of Muleskinner Blues, but it's possible the song has been creating new versions of us over the past 80 years!

By the way- If you don't like your job, then put the buck-buck-bucket down...

MISFITS of APATHY, TAPHOPHILIA, and FASHION

A man who knows no boundaries because he never goes anywhere. Another man who smiles when his own shadow resembles a headstone more than it resembles himself. A young woman who is worried how she looks even though she always looks good. These are roommates.

ERIC GILL IS YOUR LOVER

Devout Catholic and sexual deviant, East Sussex born Eric Gill (1882 - 1940) was also dubbed a Royal Designer for Industry.

Gill found himself in each of those categories through no half-hearted circumstances. At 18 years of age, he moved to London to study architecture. A shift in interests, with good result, led him to Stone Masonry and Calligraphy classes in the evening. Gill developed his type design to an unforgettable esteem. The Gill Sans typeface is a near perfect Humanist style that is most likely in all default font lists on nearly every computer in the world. Gill never strayed from his Catholic roots no matter how unorthodox his religious practices. He strived to connect his appreciation for both art and religion through various essays discussing their relationships. In 1989, elements of Gill's personal diaries were published in a biography and shocked the world with confessions of many sexual exploits and sexual abuses. Some of the perverse corners of his private life appear in many of his engravings. The controversy of his art always rivaled the exquisite nature of it, but neither content or talent ever won out over the other. Gill had always been accepted as strange in the art and design world, and his output was immense. He could sculpt, work with letter form, write, and print his own engravings. He succeeded at being both a man artistically rounded, and deeply flawed. We should all be so lucky.

MAN OF CLAY

When I was young, a pencil and a piece of paper were all I needed to be in control of everything. I was in control of my classroom education doodling in margins of notes, on my homemade brown paper bag textbook covers, and on the back of virtually every test and ditto sheet given to me in Elementary School. I was in control of the choir and the baby crying at church, drawing on the Sunday program. I controlled when day turned into night, when I fell asleep clutching a pencil in mid-stroke on a sketch pad. I created real things. I knew they weren't alive, but they were close to it. Characters came into existence and into being and as far as I was concerned, they were one step away from being a three dimensional toy in my hand. They were the icons of a video game that should have been made. They were maps of my dreams and nightmares, but most of all, they were cool.

Soon I started having more patience with anatomy and form in my drawings and the lines began to take a familiar shape. "...those look like your hands...," my mother would say. they were. these things I drew now had my hands. Hair, facial structure and body type followed suit. even clothing. The curious part of it all is that sometimes it was a different me; An older me. A different hairline here and a different clothing style there, they were still me but less familiar.

I've noticed these traits bubble to the surface in reality just as randomly as they did on the page. My hair receded the way 'old' Justin's hair looked. The knuckles on my hands and the corners of my eyes aged accordingly. Is it possible that all along, my drawings were blueprints? Did I become what my preteen-self decided I would become? Not only do I believe it's true, but I've matured enough to realize that there isn't just one step between the drawing and the final product. There are many steps, and I'm going to continue to be in control.

Lichtenstein

HOMEMADE PLANETS

The ball has begun rolling in the right direction. At the very least, the planets may be on my side. Although, when things go wrong, people always tell me it's because Mercury is in retrograde. Go F*** yourself, Mercury. And why are Astrology people such weirdos.

Short on cash, I planned to raid my bank account for the maximum amount I could spare before the rent check clears. The stupid holiday prevented me from doing that. Lucky for me, the stupid holiday might provide the opportunity to scavenge a local Barbeque for much needed sustenance. I will do so with the utmost gratitude in my heart for having kind friends, and for not being able to share so much as a bag of chips for others to enjoy. I hope I don't get called out as the 4th of July Freeloader!

BIRTH OF A ONE MAN NATION

I woke up an hour ago and managed to get 5 hours of sleep after foolishly drinking a Monster Energy drink last night at 10 o'clock on a near empty stomach. Don't ever do that. It leaves you feeling really weird and awake. My cold is lifted substantially and I have accumulated a record of my woes in the form of crumpled tissue. Hopefully I've blown most of my surfaced id out through my nose and I can begin to pull myself together starting today. I'm excited. I'm still very angry. I'm still very sad. Overall, If I tell myself to be excited I feel a subtle wave of elation course through my body. I really have nothing to lose from this point on. oh... except for my apartment if I can't afford rent next month! Yikes! Okay... getting the ball rolling NOW!

GOOD MORNING

POWERS THAT BE

This post is meant to be a lighthearted departure from everything I've been struggling with lately. Still feeling sick. Made the mistake of drinking a Monster Energy drink after only eating two real meals today. Feel kind of drunk off the stuff. Very awake and weird weird weird. Eyes pulsating. Listening to Thomas Koner to hopefully settle my nerves and lift my spirit. I've decided those two guys down there must be gods. How could they not be?

MEET PEOPLE YOU CAN NEVER KNOW

Hieronymus Bosch (loosely pronounced: har•uh'•nimmus - boss) is by far one of my favorite painters of all time. There is very little known about his life. Barely a trace of his birthdate exists (he is presumed to have been born sometime around 1450.) There are records that prove he died on August 9th 1516, and by leaving a legacy of fewer than 25 paintings, Bosch becomes that much more precious to his admirers. His paintings are part religious-part grotesque mutant masterpieces. The collection almost seems to triple once you lay eyes on each painting. Either in the form of a triptych or in the hyper-detailed complex worlds of characters and corridors, his paintings take a lifetime to absorb.

Bosch's mysterious pieces have subliminally influenced some of my work. Researching him for this blog reminded me of his Seven Deadly Sins "chart" which holds a similar form to one of my recent drawings, but mine surely pales in comparison to the master's.

one of my recent drawings

'Seven Deadly Sins' by Bosch

GO TO PLACES YOU FORGOT EVEN EXISTED

Click the play button on the video below to listen while reading this post!

Leyland Kirby's music welcomed itself into my iTunes Library and settled itself amongst the other songs like an old friend. I can't seem to remember what led me to his music, so I'm assuming it found me instead. This isn't surprising, because the nature of the music wouldn't have it any other way. His The Caretaker project, particularly the album Persistent Repetition of Phrases (hopefully that link works and you can download it for yourself!), is so haunting and familiar and frightening and peaceful. To describe it much further would be to describe an out of body experience or past life regression. For PRP, Kirby manipulated old ballroom records from the 20s and 30s, but somehow these dusty half-present creeping tones remind us of something not a generation away; instead, something stitched into our hearts and somewhere behind our own minds. Delight, loss, whimsy, and burden are revealed. coexisting... waltzing together, even.

Kirby's other projects are just as oddly captivating. Purely sad are his original compositions under the name Leyland Kirby, and his V/VM project is a strange abrasive bastard form of sampled electronic pop.

LOOK OUT

Have your gears started moving yet? I'm pretty sure all of mine aren't. One big fat gear may be the only one moving in my head ever - so - slow - ly. Shouldn't be long before it makes one complete rotation and all the other tickings will begin; As did the tickings in the brain of Ralph Emerson, leader of the mid-19th century Transcendentalist movement. Around 1836 the poet and philosopher's vision was characterized into the drawing below. it reads (phrase is completed from original text):

"Standing on the bare ground,--my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space,--all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball. I am nothing. I see all. The currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or parcel of God"- from Nature by Ralph Waldo Emerson

tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick

IDEA MACHINE

TED is an ever growing roundtable of thinkers. Celebrities, scientists, philosophers, and comedians talk about anything from 'The Theory of Everything' to 'Legos for Adults' to 'A New Way to Fight Corruption'.

Truly an information overload. TED manages to almost make me feel one-dimensional.

MELTDOWN

Recently I walked out on my Job. It felt terrible and it still does. I've also managed to get sick in the same day, which probably has something to do with the stress of it all. A meltdown is fast approaching for me, and I've never been less financially and mentally secure. I'm angry. I'm sad. The world is no longer familiar to me. I'm a little scared, but I also have a chance to be a hero! I can save myself, and stand up for what I think is right.

I've also possibly confused exposing you to a blog as a sneak attack to exposing you to my problems. I'll try to keep these 'whine-a-bouts' to a minimum; However, If you have been asleep for so long and see a nightmare fast approaching, how do you wake up to contend with the nightmare? A little lesson in Lucidity(fig.1)? Possibly the right pair of shades(fig.2)?

(fig.1)

(fig.2)

OSMOSIS

You can be sure to see a lot of music references on Code of Posture, and I hope they always help to illustrate what I'm feeling, and what you could be feeling in order to try to understand what Phillip Glass feels. You may remember this first video from your childhood or your child's childhood. This was made for us, and it kind of represents that complex doorway that we trip through into intelligent and creative thinking. Much like the 'Dawning' moments seen throughout Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey. a monolithic student/teacher moment.

TYPE and A GIRL NAMED HOPE

hello! This is my first blog and I'm surely going to need some time to understand the pace of the blogging world. Since I am constantly changing and rearranging my interests and priorities and obsessions, I should give you a sample of my current state.

Type Records! Everything this label puts out is expansive and emotionally refined!

here's some Richard Skelton. He can get a little tedious, perhaps, but worth a listen.

Back in the day Hope Sandoval and her band Mazzy Star had this same effect on me. They still do.

I'll try to fill in the spaces between this framework in future posts! Please do listen and have a good cry on me!