Missives from the Birdcage

End of an era

Really, the era ended last year when the club shut down, but with the death of HIlly Kristal, the founder of CBGBs, it has truly come to an end. I have many a fond memory of the club, of bands I saw play there, of hanging out with friends (who were both on and off the stage). This series of pictures was made in the photo booth at CB's in the early 1990s, Julee and I there to see some band, back when I was living in Brooklyn.

CBGBs

***

Sigh. I was going to leave it at that. I was. But.... well.... it's the end of the same era, really, in the form of the demise of Leona Helmsley. I saw the death notice and thought about posting something... and then though, nooooo.... I mean, the woman's just died! How can you post anything? Shouldn't speak ill of the dead.

And then. And then. And then they read the will. For the love of god, she left more to her dog (apparently a little biter, no less) than she did to her grandchildren combined. She left two out completely. She gave the dog twelve million dollars. And then told two of her grandchildren "you know what you did." Good gravy.

I remember the Queen of Mean. I remember that "taxes are for the little people." I'd like to think that that kind of spitefulness passed with an era, but... then I see that Paris Hilton is popular for.... I'm not sure what, and she's rich and catty and thinks she's above the, ahem, "little people" and the law and think.... I guess Leona Helmsley's passing doesn't signify the passing of an age so much as the passing of a sad, nutty woman. (Really, I think if you can get to the end of your life and be so angry at 50% of your grandchildren that you leave them out of the will, and so worried that your memory and that of your son will be forgotten by the other 50% that they have to be held financially hostage, well... that strikes me as dysfunctional and incomparably sad. It's like the plot of a Sidney Sheldon book or something.... they have to visit the grave or no dough? $3million for washing her mauseleum? Yowzers.... You know, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that if you hadn't been quite so... ahem.... difficile in life, you wouldn't have to extort remembrance from your grandchildren).

Wunderkammer

Okay, I've been fascinated with wunderkammers-- well the idea of wunderkammers because, really, how many people keep them now, or really since the eighteenth century?-- for a very very long time. In grad school I became really interested in them, but ultimately had bigger (dissertation) fish to fry and had to put that on the back burner (the stuff I wrote about was post-wunderkammer age, though there is something of the wunderkammer in many SEAsian art collections, so they made a cameo appearance).

The point being that I've been dreaming of wunderkammers. Not, like, dreaming of having one or anything, just that they've been making an appearance in my subconscious yarn-spinning, and I often at least take a gander at the things that my subconscious is talking about. So I went to Amazon to see if I could find any of those books I poked through when I had access to a super awesome research library and... did not really hit pay dirt. I found a few things, most of which were incredibly expensive and that I wasn't sure enough about to drop any cash on without seeing. But there was one paperback that I found used for just a couple of bucks, and thought, eh, I'll order that. A week or so later Lawrence Weschler's Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder appeared on my doorstep.

Not exactly what I was looking for... okay, not at all what I was looking for, but still an enjoyable read. It isn't about the wunderkammers I was thinking of, but rather about the (also fascinating, for totally different reasons) Museum of Jurassic Technology. (How badly do I want to go to this museum? Bad enough that I'd brave LA again to do so. Which is saying something, LA not being my favorite place).

Any old way, I recommend the book as a quick, delightful read, though I recommend used copies less so. At least the copy I got, which involved a lot of underlining (rather random underlining-- what was this person looking for? Not the main idea, not anything whose pattern could be followed) and many painful asides, including the notation of the obvious, the unfortunate misunderstanding/misinterpretation, and the pointless commentary. Mostly these comments in round, bubbly, painfully girlwriting were annoying and distracting, but occassionally they were amusing. Here's the one I enjoyed the most, including the passage she underlined and her reaction to it:

"Anyway, my colleague recounted for me how during one of the sieges of Pavia-- Pavia always seemed to be coming under seige in those days-- Spallazani realized that he was dying of some urinary-tract infection; he kept careful notes on the progress of the disease and authorized an autopsy after death so that his colleagues could study the bladder and kidneys themselves. Only, his corpse fell into the hands of his sworn enemy and fiercest rival, I forget the guy's name, an anatomist-- in my own mind I always think of him as Scarpia, as in Tosca. So anyway, this Scarpia extracted not only Spallazani's bladder and kidneys but his entire reproductive apparatus as well, which he thereupon proceeded to display with considerable glee. Remember: this is Italy, and such emasculation was just about the worst affront to a man's honor that could be imagined. So that years later, after Scarpia died, Spallazani's old students got ahold of his corpse, decapitated it, and preserved the head in a jar of its own, which to this day rests on a shelf in the museum right nearby Spallazani's."

And right under it, in bubbly handwriting, she's scribbled. Yikes.

fox confessor

We went to see Neko Case at the 9:30 Club last night. I saw her at the same venue last year, not long after the release of Fox Confessor Brings the Flood, which immediately became my new favorite "album." (I don't know what to call them anymore. I bought it on CD, then put it in my iTunes, so I guess it's my favorite collection of musicy ones and zeros? In any case, if we were still doing vinyl I'd have worn it out, I've played it so much). I've played it so much that Phil recognized a lot of the songs that were played last night, despite never having heard of her before.

It was a great show-- she's a really solid performer. I got to be close to stage this time (last time I was in the balcony), but had to leave my camera at the door :(. It's amazing to watch someone with an incredible voice that seems/feels/sounds like it's resonanting up from deep in the depths make it look like it's taking no more effort than humming a tune while cooking dinner.

She's coming back in a few months with the New Pornographers, but, alas, the show is sold out and I don't have tickets (boo, hiss). Hopefully they'll come back around again...

Update: DCist has a review of the show.

The King is Dead, Long Live the King

So, I was going to post something about today being the 30th anniversary of the death of everyone's favorite hunka hunka burnin' love. But then my friend meanlouise beat me to it, with links and a great story about Selma and a shrine and what not. (Though I do need to tell her that I'm as Yankee as they come, and my plan, since I was about 18, was to visit KitschHeaven, aka Graceland. It is a pilgrimage still waiting to happen).

So I'm not going to write that blog post. But I will say that I, too, remember where I was, just shy of my sixth birthday, when Elvis died. I was in the car with my mother. My mom was never really an Elvis fan. Actually, she was a fanatical Rolling Stones fan, which was kind of oil to Elvis water. So we're in the car-- one of those dealies with the benchseat across the front-- and I'm on the passenger side-ish (maybe more in the middle) of the bench when the radio announcer comes on the radio (tellin' me a-no a-no... okay, not really, but, you know.... she was a Stones fan. So I knew Stones songs), and in a voice reminiscent of the announcer describing the crash of the Hindenburg (not that I made that association at the time or anything)-- Oh the Humanity!-- to announce the death of Elvis.

"The King is dead! Oh, it is a tragedy! It is a loss for America! For the World! Oh... the King! The King is dead!"

In my memory he begins to sob, though, surely, some of this has taken on new meaning and details since it happened. Though, you know, people felt like that about him, so it's entirely possible that he did start sobbing. Anyway, being that I was wee and in that stage of life where you're trying to sort and organize and categorize and what not, this confused the hell out of me. Because, you see, I'd already learned that America, unlike fairy tale lands with princesses and whatnot, and unlike England (which I had a fairy tale feeling about from childhood through high school, first as the place where all that Robin Hood-Sleeping Beauty-Snow White kinda stuff happened {I believe this association as a direct result of my asking what the dealio with the royalty in fairy tales was and my mother explaining that long ago lots of places had royalty, and some places still do, like England}, to my two hours of fascination with Princess Diana {spent watching the wedding, live, at butt early o'clock in the morning, only to realize that a) weddings are boring; b) a train that long is stupid; and c) the only thing more boring than weddings is watching boring people and horse faced princes not enjoying themselves getting married. That was also the death of any interest I had in things girly.}, segueing seamlessly into my jealousy of its early and so cool punk scene, as I became a punk rocker.... pretty much at the end of the royal wedding) did not have such things. So why was this guy screaming about the death of the King?

"Mom? Who's the King?"

"Elvis, honey."

Pause.

"I though America didn't have a king."

"It doesn't, honey."

"Then why is he saying that the king is dead?"

"Because he means Elvis. He isn't a king who runs the country. He was a singer."

Pause.

"That's stupid."

So there you have it, my pronuciation on Elvis at age five and three-quarters. I wasn't ready for kitsch in 1977. Now, however, I own lamps almost identical to these, which are apparently in the king's parents' bedroom. They're in my living room.

the taste of sight

Mini-rant: Why do products that we consume (food, drinks) change their packaging, and then highlight that? I drink diet soda pretty regularly, and the bottle I got today at the store says on the side of it: New Look Same Great Taste. Did I miss something? Why do I care what the bottle looks like? I'm not keeping the bottle... that gets recycled.... so it really doesn't matter what it looks like, as long as the contents are the same. Are they afraid that I won't recognize the brand now that they've changed it, and therefore need to point out that it may look different, but it's the same inside? And if that is the case, I have to say... uh... don't change the packaging? I suspect it is because humans have a lot in common with magpies.... we like shiny shiny things, and don't care what's inside.

losing time

Coming home from work the other day I hit the commute from hell... one of those reminders about why, while the newness of the D.C. Metro system makes it seem like it's a well maintained and organized system, it's actually pretty crappy. Usually I'm reminded of this when I take the bus and am standing on a corner in a sketchy place for work and the bus just ain't coming. But the other evening was a two hour train odyssey to get from Metro Center home.

One thing I have realized is that the train system here doesn't like the summer. Every summer I've been here there's a spike in the number of problems that happen. When I got on the green line from work the train that pulled up had the third car dark and out of service. I had an errand to run downtown and walked upstairs at Chinatown, past the red line train that pulled up on the platform with its third car out of service. Errand run, a quick stop at the library to pick up some books, I hauled my heavy bag of books to Metro Center, passing another red line train with a car out of service on the way down to the orange/blue line platform-- which was jam packed. There was no place to get off the escalator. There had to be a thousand people-- more-- on the platform. A blue line train sat on the track, doors open... except for the third car, which was dark and out of service. Trains pulled in and out of the other side (some with cars out of service), but nothing moved heading in the direction of home. An announcement came over the intercom: a train broken down just before Rosslyn.

See, when this happens, particularly when this happens at rush hour, I start feeling very grumpy about the fact that whomever designed the system seems to have learned from the Titanic school of transportation design: it will never breakdown, so why build in ways of dealing with such things? In all of the years that I lived in New York I only once ever saw the platform look like it did the other night: in 1991 when the worst wreck since 1918 happened on the IRT. (I have a very distinct recollection of it because it was my first day going back to college after twice pulling out and I had to go through Union Station on the L from Williamsburg to the 5 train to Flatbush). In D.C. I see this a couple times a year. Whoever thought that having only one track (as opposed to the local/express in NYC) was a good idea should be forced to do customer service on the days when there is a breakdown.

So. Waiting waiting waiting. The blue line train fiiiiiiiinally pulls out. An orange line train pulls in, but it's nuts and there is no way I'm getting on. So I wait. People stuff themselves in like sardines. But the doors don't close. Five minutes. Ten minutes. Fifteen minutes. The announcements in the station say that there are delays, but that the broken down train has been cleared. So what gives? The conductor announces that, yes, the train at Rosslyn was cleared. But now there is a switch out at Foggy Bottom. Another ten minutes passes. The train finally pulls out-- the third card blacked out and out of service. Another blue line train, and then another orange line train, which I make my way into and get stuck, squashed uncomfortably against the corner of a divider.

It was sloooow going, lots of angry people, and it was hot in the train. A fist fight nearly broke out at Foggy Bottom when six people tried to push their way on to the train. When I finally got to our stop I watched the train pull out-- third car dark and out of service. The parking lot was pandemonium. I spot P standing up in the jeep, waving his arms, at the other side of the lot and nearly get hit twice trying to get there. He tells me that people were acting like idiots the whole time he was waiting and there were several altercations that nearly came to blows.

So. A day when I'd been excited about the idea of getting home at a reasonable hour (I'd had fantasies of cooking dinner! Of scanning film! Of reading a little bit!) we walked in the door after nine. And I only live seven miles from work.

****

I did get my first couple of rolls of film back from the new Pentax 6x7 I picked up a couple of weeks ago. (I sold a few pieces at Artomatic, so this is what I spent the proceeds on) Nothing terribly exciting on the roll (mostly still life-y country stuff from the wet-plate jamboree), but it takes nice pictures. Well worth the hassle of hauling that thing (it weighs a ton and it ridiculously unweildy) around.

queen anne's lace