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Weak L

11 December 2022

No. 2,805 (cartoon)

I missed you.

You didn’t miss me when you hit me.

No one’s perfect.

12 December 2022

Remembering Ko Isono

When I was in my late twenties, I went sixty hours without sleep working on a very important blockbuster report on illegal whaling that would change Everything. This is when preparing a publication involved paper, scissors, glue, and other tools Fred Flintstone might have used. I was hallucinating when I turned over the project to the printer.

I learned a lot from the experience. The report didn’t change anything; they never do. I learned not to sacrifice my well-being for anything that almost certainly won’t make a difference. And most importantly, I discovered the sentence that would serve me well over the decades: A lack of planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine.

I’m writing this in remembrance of Ko Isono, an engineer working on a vitally important Apple project that would change Everything. The long hours of trying to meet impossible deadlines proved to be too much to bear, and thirty years ago tonight Isono went back to his apartment and put a bullet through his head.

The product launched without him; he sacrificed his life for the Newton MessagePad, a device that changed nothing and can only be found today among the curious exhibits in the Oops wing of the Computer History Museum.

I’m not sure if George Patton’s advice is a corollary for this tragic little cautionary tale, but here it is: “Don’t die for your country. Let the other son of a bitch die for his.”

When it comes to witty repartee, no one beats Eric Cartman’s, “Screw you guys, I’m going home.” Too bad Isono died years before he could have followed such a fine example of self-preservation.

13 December 2022

Doll and Syringe

I photographed my mother’s porcelain doll that she’s had for eighty(!) years holding one of her dog’s insulin syringes. The composition and technique are fine: with no false modesty, I’m good at my craft. But in combining two bad clichés, I ended up with a photograph that’s worse than either of them.

There’s a lot to be said for learning from mistakes, or, in this case, relearning. I suppose this is just an example of aesthetic math: one negative plus another negative equals two negatives, maybe more.

14 December 2022

Snakes Got Clitorises Too!

The year is ending as it began, with clitorises in the headlines. In January it was “Dolphins Got Clitorises,” and now it’s “Snakes Got Clitorises Too!” As Lara remarked earlier, “I hope I live long enough to find out whether researchers can find one in humans.”

About the only new aspect to the “discovery” of something that’s always been there is the new dimension it adds to the old fairy tale of Adam and Eve. I wonder if the snake introduced the couple to forbidden fruit in addition to the apple?

And speaking of revisiting old stories, I’ll repeat the timeless joke from the 11 January notebook entry on dolphins.

What’s the difference between a clitoris and a pub?

Men can usually find a pub.

15 December 2022

Don’t Let That Fool You

Donald Drumph, the incompetent businessman and failed coup leader, still shines as a grifter. He’s selling “digital trading cards” at a hundred dollars a pop that feature him as a superhero.

His diet of cheeseburgers and soft drinks has given him the physique of a bloated colostomy bag with pudgy limbs of fat and cellulite protruding. The cartoonish images, however, depict him as Baron Munchausen after ingesting a kilo of steroids and hallucinogens, or perhaps someone who’s spent his life in a gym, when in fact Drumph’s never set foot in a gym or a library.

I am grateful for the comic relief, especially since this is the perfect time to cite a lesser-known Groucho Marx quote I’ve been sitting on for months: “He may look, act, and sound like an idiot, but don’t let that fool you. He’s an idiot.”

16 December 2022

Remembering Robert Cumming

A while back I asked the Internet what one of my favorite artists was up to these days, and the Internet told me that Robert Cumming died a year ago today. Since I allege that this is an artist’s notebook of sorts, it’s time to talk about art with a long overdue panegyric.

I long ago paid Cumming my highest compliment: I copied him. (I was younger and didn’t know any better.) Not only did I plagiarize his work, but I also emulated his approach. Cumming is the reason I bought an eight-by-ten view camera, not any of the f64 luminaries.

I was surprised to discover that he did most of his photography over a relatively short period in the seventies. By the time I got around to “being informed by” (which sounds much better than “plagiarizing”) his work, he’d already moved on. What an hombre!

Years ago I gave away all of my books except maybe a dozen or two. I kept three of Cumming’s slim volumes, A Training in the Arts, A Discourse on Domestic Disorder, and Interruptions in Landscape and Logic. If I live long enough, I’ll revisit them someday when I’m looking for a new vein to mine. I can’t think of a better tribute than that so it’s time to say goodbye.

Coming next weak: more of the same.

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©2022 David Glenn Rinehart