So Cheap. Part One.

Like the majority of people milling about on the earth's crust, I live on a fixed income; within the bounds of   tight purse strings. Not outrageously tight, like so many others, but just snug enough that I have to keep an eye on things.  I don't have to collect cans in order to afford a cup of coffee, yet I do not blow my nose using a new Hermes scarf each time. I recycle. I reuse, I thrift, I am money conscious. But I do not think that I am too cheap.

This brings me to my point, how cheap is too cheap? How do you live within financial boundaries without fucking over your fellow worker half the world away? Or even in the same community? I think the answer lies with our grandparents. Not with the boomers. Fuck no. They got us into this mess. All of this 80's conspicuous consumption and bad credit is a direct result of them being a bunch of manic fuckups on a grand scale. Multiple cars, multiple homes, multiple lines of credit, mortgages; triple bypass.

Let's bring it back to our Nan's.
Let's use their sensibility to live. And SAVE!
Let's also use our empathy and consumer literacy.

For instance...
If you see a wrap dress at a big box store for 9.99$...score, right?
Wrong?
Let's see...
A ten dollar dress gives the retailers ( my absolute guess, based on nothing but hunches ) next to nothing,  maybe a couple of dollars. Same to the wholesaler. Let's give them 2.00.  That is 6.00 left.  It costs to ship, so let's skim that off.  Let's give 5.00 to the manufacturer. Fabric...shave another 2.00 off.  That is 3 dollars. You can bet the owners and the managers are making the majority of that 3 dollars. Not much left to the sewers, warehouse people, quality or designers.
Can you imagine the sort of pride and culture of  fine workmanship that making pennies an hour would cultivate. You would be getting a garment made of passing grade fabric, made by grindingly poor workers that squeaked by quality control.

Most likely the last hands that touched your garment were not of happy couturiers, pleased with their work and lovingly folding your dress for shipping.

Isn't that experience that our demand instigates,  worth having less to create/preserve?

Wouldn't it be worth it to save and buy something well made and fairly priced, rather than to have a pile of clothes made by near slave labour?

I think so.

Why not support merchants that stock quality, not quantity.

Why not save for a dress that one can wear for years rather than for a season?

Spicy

Homemade tzatziki made with enough garlic to knock the buzzards off a shit wagon. Yah!

Who, me?

Yes, you!

West on Art History.

Oh, I love references to the canon ( of western art). I just do.  It is a wink and a nod to a rich past of academia that many of us are still mourning the passing of.  Damn, I wish I was still an undergrad taking class after class of fascinating subjects, opening me more and more up to the level of intellectual promiscuity that I craved. And still do.  And now, here we are.
We have sum of our learnings, firing away between our ears, begging to be let out, taken for a walk, anything!

Well, I am giving a quick flash of art history largess. I just have to let it out.

It may seem a little frenetic. I have not been manicuring or brushing it like academia required; picking choice words from a rich and leathery lexicon, composing flowing prose and constructing arguments supported by well gathered facts and sources. So here it goes...it's going to sound really Kanye.

OMG WHAT THE FUCK JEFF WALL!
What you doin'?
All that shit in the studio, man, what the fuck!
People think they know...looks like a single off the cuff shot.


Mary Pratt, don't die on me, sister. I need you.

Donatello, oh your David is so sensuous  and it yet creeps the ever living hell out of me.
Could you have made your Mary Magdalene a little uglier if you tried?
However, I can see where you are coming from and can appreciate what you are trying to accomplish.

Caravaggio, you talented talented asshole.

Gaugin, keep it in your pants. Fuck man. 13?

Lawren Harris, I love you.

Mark Rothko...I am sorry no one saved you.

Robert Motherwell, thank you for Elegy to a Spanish Republic. I cannot place just why.

Eric Fischl, Your work is so hauntingly brilliant. I think you have captured it.

Damn, I love Italian Futurist Sculpture!

Fuck you British Museum. You know why. Yours in hatred, Greece.

I love you British Museum, you know why.  Yours in cassis, Me.

Nan and Cindy, damn!

Frida, beautiful soul in a lemon skin bag, am I right?

Oh, it's One A.M. oops!

Lavender

Before I peel myself away from the commuter for the night, I wanted to address something that has been on my mind for quite a few days....gay youth and suicide. I would like to widen everyone's scope just a tad...there are people at their worst and at the bottom of the well looking up and seeing nothing.  Good people who are bullied, mentally ill, chemically unbalanced, you name it. Gay, bi, trans, straight, eunuchs, pre op, post op, not op, butch, femme, lipstick and breeder. Let's all hold a vigil for them, too. All of those who are on suicide watch or those who have slipped beneath the radar need to know that it will get better, too. Light a candle for everyone at their lowest and remind them that it is darkest just before the light.

I just had to post...

"Oh, I really have to pee...but I am so horny I am writhing with desire....but oh I have to pee so bad..."

The Hound of Baskervilles (after Twistie)

Well, if you know any little thing about me it is that I am a dog person. I have no bones (see what I did there, BONES! Oh ho! And we are speaking of dogs...university education at it's best...right there!) about sitting in filth and playing games, consequently picking burrs out of their fur  or in some cases even watch them shed their mortal coil.  I love dogs. I love purse dogs ( I pity the fools) little dogs, muscle dogs, family dogs...hell I have even sprung a guard dog. I worked with and at the SPCA and in a hospital. I have seen cruelty, joy, boredom, pain and the most fragrant bouts of diarrhea fountain out of some of the smallest creatures. However,  before 2000, I was phobic of dogs. PHOBIC. Not just leery of, but class schedule changing, white knuckle bearing, bad dreams having...dog phobia. Especially in the dark. Oh, and the very thought of Rottweilers sent me spiralling into thoughts of panic and not just perceived danger but I felt that it was guaranteed.

The year 2000 was the year that I moved out on my own and met that who I had feared most....face to face.
A giant schnauzer crossed with a border collie. I was picked up at the ferry terminal by my then partners parents and was given a spot in the back bank of seats shared by the dog. She barked and panted and planted her big paws on my lap and gave me the once over with her schnozz.  I was so terrified; shaking, over stimulated and trapped!

On Quechua's end, I was a great if not odd new friend. Quiet, obedient  and wreaking of rodents. ( I had a guinea pig)

Finally, at our destination, I flung open the doors and hid in the den. She couldn't find me in there, I shut the french doors....oh damn! There were another pair leading from the den into the living room. She found me!

The question "Can someone walk the dog before dinner?" then echoed from out of the kitchen.
I was returning to pouring over whatever non canine distraction I could find.  It might have even been Utne reader (quite out of character), when I realized that assignment was directed at me! Or perhaps it was my polite upbringing laced with martyrdom. Either way, I felt as though the task fell before me.

And I picked up the leash.

The attaching the leash to the collar may have been the most teeth gritting part of the whole supposed ordeal. She was a live one; bucking and jostling with excitement over the very sight of the leash and plastic bag combination. And I was barely hanging on. I felt as though I was a bullrider, hanging on for dear life while this fractious animal rounded and arched her back.  *Click*

Thank god.

Now we were attached...now we were out the fuckingdooratapaceneverusedbeforebymyself. Omigodlookatthatlookaroundthecornerlookatthatpieceofgarbageandbushletssniffeverythingyah!
She walked me to the closest park and took me to all of her favourite places; using her urine for emphasis. "Now this slide is my FAVORITE! See how many precious drams I drained there?"

She had an excitement of life that I loved and that I felt in some place deep inside my soul connect with hers. We were both silly girls. On a sunny day. With some pocket money! Away we went.
We snuck a snack before dinner, we loitered, we even peed in front of strangers. Well, she did.
It was so fun; fun being an understatement of epic proportions, because what had just taken place had been of epic proportions.  I had found someone that shared my very pure joy with.

That night, we played some more games, games that she crafted to test my quickly melting level of fear.
Her favourite being: "I'm going to stare you down, then charge at your face and then actually lick you Ah ha ha ha ha ha!"

She knew. She Soooooo knew.

I know have my own schnauzer, and I have the pleasure of walking her whenever I please.

Thank You, Quechua.

The Stories Behind The Craigslist Free Stuff Ads...

1) "Damnit Dan! We agreed that you would get your goddamned bottles out of here by October! Here it is nearly Hallowe'en and I am tripping all over these fucking things and scattering them all over the garage floor. That's it! I have had it. I want them gone tomorrow, Dan. TO-MORROW. Not soon, not this weekend, TO-MORROW!"
http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/rds/zip/2014122323.html

2) "Ugh, these bed bugs are everywhere! The exterminator told me that he would do his best to get 'em all, but I just don't feel safe sleeping on that bed knowing that they were all living in there! It's such a shame, a new mattress and all. So expensive. Throwing it out would be such a waste..."
http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/van/zip/2014777997.html

3) Is that what you are calling them...riiiight. Because of the artistry? The composition of the photographs? Look, mate....I have more years of Art History under my belt than you have extra holes punched into yours. That's right....six!  You know what Art History students do all day? Talk about ART! Not once did we mention, discuss or have any of subject matter broached in your "old photography magazines" come up as a genuine or relevant work(s) of art. That's right.."Puss in Boots" and " Beaver Hunt" were not in the syllabus.
http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/rds/zip/2011220806.html