This is a sketch of the famous “Green Mosque” – a postmodern architectural wonder in the imaginary city of Temisa (written تَمسا in the Bofobundan language), also known as Lagartópolis.
Month: May 2020
Caveat: Poem #1391 “A picture”
ㅁ Hello blue flowers. Please discuss your appearance. Use one thousand words.
– a pseudo-haiku.
Caveat: Tree #505
This tree was along my walking commute to work in Ilsan, Korea. I took this picture in November, 2015.
[daily log: walking, 2km]
Caveat: Art #25
This is another collage from around 1992, inspired by the style of Georges Braque.
Caveat: mysterious wire connector thingy
Arthur really wants to buy some of these – somewhere online.
The problem is that neither he nor I have any idea what they are called. Some kind of locking electrical connector. But all of Arthur’s and my googling skills have turned up nary an image of one. So I’m putting this out there.
What is this called? I will attach three pictures, to show how it fits together. Overall connected size is about 1 1/2 inch long, but Arthur says there are different sizes.
[UPDATE: My brother Andrew got me the googlable name for these things. “Te Conn Knife Disconnectors“. Thank you Andrew and thanks all others who took the time to investigate! Logically (vis-a-vis Arthur’s affection for them), they are used in aircraft wiring.]
Caveat: Poem #1390 “Eighteenth stanza”
ㅁ Kiamon traveled to worlds beyond ken using her mind to find meaning again. Body in place, like a somnolent monk, worlds coalesced out of cognitive junk.
– a quatrain in dactylic tetrameter.
Caveat: Tree #504
This tree is too close for comfort.
[daily log: walking, 2km]
Caveat: Art #24
This is a still life I drew around 1994 – I can date it based on the footwear shown – they are running shoes and an old army boot, on top of a woven throw rug I got in Mexico in 1989.
Caveat: draining…
Arthur’s house has a drain.
Meaning, there’s a valve down near the water that you can open to drain the entire house’s water system. This is useful and important for when you want to winterize the house, to prevent water from freezing in the pipes in the event the house won’t be heated for a period of time.
Over the past winter the valve apparently broke. This wasn’t a problem because there is also a valve inside the house that leads out to this valve, so we just kept that inside valve closed. But when we went to use the boat, we realized that the dock water supply is downstream from that inside-the-house valve. That meant that the only way we could get the water running on the dock was to fix this house-drain valve.
That’s what I did this morning. Arthur borrowed a PEX-pipe-fitting crimping tool from our neighbor Mike, and we’d bought a new valve at the hardware store last Thursday, so I took off the old broken valve and put on the new one.
I feel almost competent, some days.
Caveat: Poem #1389 “Past and present”
ㅁ In the city, there are many sounds: subways hum; sirens sing; trucks pass. Sometimes I dream these old sounds. At three-forty A.M., to birds and rain, here, I snap awake. Already, it is light.
– a nonnet.
Caveat: Tree #503
This tree witnesses the departing day.
[daily log: walking, 1.5km]
Caveat: Art #23
I drew this in 2015.
Caveat: Poem #1388 “Patter”
ㅁ After ten days of unraining, dull times, Clouds' tiny footsteps compose their small rhymes.
– a couplet in dactylic tetrameter.
Caveat: Tree #502
This young alder appeared on the slope below the new driveway.
[daily log: walking, 2km]
Caveat: Looking down and wondering
I was up a ladder leaned against a tree working on my treehouse. And I thought, “This is ironic.”
I have a discomfort with exposed heights. I’ve commented on it before, in the context of Arthur’s seeming affection for high places, ladders, rooftops, and such. I don’t know that it is so extreme that it merits being termed “fear of heights” or acrophobia. In the right context, I enjoy being up high – but don’t trust my own body’s coordination and sense of balance so I need to feel secure in my perch if I’m up high.
So I was up the ladder. I thought, “Why am I building a treehouse? Wouldn’t I be more appropriately building a bunker or a cave?”
Caveat: Art #22
I drew this in that 1992 art class. I believe it’s a direct portrait of a fellow student in that class.
Caveat: Poem #1387 “Obviously”
ㅁ I went to the road. There I found a thing to say. And so I said it.
– a pseudo-haiku.
Caveat: Tree #501
This tree has a hole in it. I put the hole there, as part of my treehouse project. So this tree is the same tree that can be seen on the left in Tree #499.
[daily log: walking, 2km; smashing finger, 1]
Caveat: Art #21
This is art. I drew it in maybe 2014.
Caveat: Smashing
I was working on my treehouse. I was using a drill to drill a hole in the tree, to attach my special treehouse mounting brackets I got last year.
The drill had enough torque to drill the hole in the tree. But my hand wasn’t strong enough to hold the drill in place, and I smashed my left index finger against the tree with the drill as is kicked against my grip rotationally.
I took a break from treehouse efforts and made some Chilean-style fish chowder (chupe de pescado) using some freezer-burned salmon and some fresh-caught halibut. You can see a nice chunk of each on the spoon.
Caveat: Poem #1386 “A thousand words”
ㅁ cloud-fragments caught in water, like pink paint; nature's thoughts faint... earth's blotter... there: got her.
– an englyn cil-dwrn
Caveat: Tree #500
The five-hundredth tree differs in few respects from many other trees. But it is unique.
[daily log: walking, 1.5km; fishing, ~40 nautical miles]
Caveat: Halibut #1
Last year’s fishing season we were halibutless.
We went out with Joe this morning, and out at San Francisco Point on the eastern edge of Noyes Island, we caught one modest-sized halibut. So I think (hope) Arthur was pleased.
We trolled for salmon, too. A lot. The salmon were uninterested in our hooks.
Here we are trolling by Joe’s house, just down the inlet a mile or so. Joe is gazing at his house.
Here is the small halibut.
Here is a view of the “back” side of Sunnahae Mountain – that is to say, we are looking at it from the north: it’s the peak in the center. This is not the view we normally have of the mountain – we see the south side of the mountain from our home. You can click this picture to make it larger.
Caveat: Art #20
I drew this in 2012, I think.
Caveat: Poem #1385 “Hang your soul out to dry”
ㅁ Morning swallows dreams. The dawn dries out the damp soul. A stone catches sun.
– a pseudo-haiku.
Caveat: Tree #499
Closer to the ground, these two trees are hosting my treehouse plans.
[daily log: walking, 2km]
Caveat: Art #19
I’m not sure what’s going on in this picture. It looks like that person is getting electrocuted. I drew it when I had that art class in 1992 when I was in Pasadena.
Caveat: Poem #1384 “Road’s dust”
ㅁ Sun replaced all the rain that came before and dried out the road making lots of gray dust for the trucks to kick around coating the leaves of the bushes which are drawing bees with their flowers.
– a reverse nonnet.
Caveat: Tree #498
The tree saw the clouds.
[daily log: walking, 2km; tromping, 300m]
Caveat: Radish #2
I grew a radish.
Later I ate it.
Caveat: Art #18
I drew this old man from a photograph in a magazine in 1993. Michelle liked this one. For a while it was framed and on the wall, but something happened to the frame – it broke, maybe. So it’s unframed.
Caveat: Poem #1383 “The cartographer’s creation”
ㅁ
fictional settings urban landscapes distant mountains
alternate places
ghostly buildings impossible canyons angelic bridges
immaterial places
misplaced forests migratory cities shifting oceans
errant places
The places I draw
that I imagine
take shape
coalesce
make little movements
and progress
and become
curving lines baroque grids linear arabesques
imagined maps
– a quennet.
Caveat: Tree #497
This tree experienced some mist in the morning.
