The Blog About Nothing

Behold the "Seinfeld" blog.

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I really enjoy long brunches. My friend Katie and I were musing about the glories of this pseudo-meal over quiche and creme-brulee at our favorite hipster Silverlake eatery, Dusty's. Brunch is the perfect meal. You can sleep in and enjoy the most important meal of the day. It's a wonder that a thing so great hasn't been exploited by the government as cancer-causing. Or as depraved as marrying your first cousin.

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I saw Children of Men yesterday. It's the first movie in a long time that caused me to wait until the end of the credits because I had yet had the opportunity to fully collect myself. It's a wonderful film.

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I immediately bought shoes post-film to ease my worried head.

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Well, my mom bought them.

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Tomorrow is my first day as a PA. Oh, the joys of paying dues. I'm looking forward to a week's worth of lugging FBI-uniforms all over the tri-county area, and making returns all-the-live-long-day. Here's hoping that Ron Livingston will see me hard at work (cap on head, pen in hand), stop me in my tracks and either say "Holy Moses! This is the best PA I've ever seen! Some one give her an executive salary and position" or "Wow. I have never seen a more attractive woman in a black baseball hat and jeans. Will you marry me?"

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This will hereby be known as the "Delusional" blog.

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...

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I go home January 14. This is the first time I've ever referred to New York as "home." It has a nice ring to it.

PhotoBlog: The Magic of Christmas

In the spirit of Christmas (And my burgeoning insanity spurred on by the reality that, for the next two weeks/eternity, I am trapped in my Los Angeles home), here are some holiday photos for you to enjoy. Normally, I would share these precious moments with you via Yahoo! Photos (Since I refuse to put them on Facebook. Some things are sacred.), but I am befuddled by the new layout. I am saving you a stress migraine.


Behold our glorious Christmas tree. The fire is roaring; the stockings are hung by the chimney with care. Someone kill me. It's 75 degrees outside.


I present to you, Dr. George Thannisch, in all his glory. This retired pediatrician and aspiring blueberry wine-maker will tempt you with his vine-grown confection, but I advise you to run, run away!! Save yourself from the worst thirty seconds of your life while the acidic fluid flows down your throat on its way to play with your insides. (Note: I am not ignoring the impressive bounty of Santa figurines. I hope they speak for themselves.)


The Thannisch Men. I have nothing witty to say. I just like this picture.


This is my step-dad, Tim. My Uncle John built a "game room" in his backyard over the summer. I stand by my belief that he only built it to house his hunting trophies and taxidermied animals. Oh, that's right. It's a hobby.



Taxidermied turkey in-flight. It's all about presentation. Right?


My mom and her brothers.


Oh. Sweet. Moses.


Mom's proud of her roots.


When I took this picture, my mom said, "Make sure you get the lightbulb and the toothpaste in the shot."


Uncle John making his famous beer batter biscuits. Paula would be proud. I think they contain both butter and lard.


Genius?


They stay up at the Eason cabin watching Andy Griffith and shooting squirrels with cross-bows.


Two words: Trout beer-cozy.


Grandparents. Mom. Me.

Lufkin, Texas truly is the land of dreams. And if your dreams die hard, I will give you my uncle's number and he will taxidermy them for you.

Here Comes The Sun

Only hours away from my final exam of the semester, a JetBlue flight leaving promptly at 6:45AM Wednesday morning (Complete with five glorious hours of Food Network and old Project Runway marathons), and the stress-free delights of winter season, I am swamped by the daunting tasks that lie ahead within the next, extremely short, twenty seven hours. Not even taking into account the fact that my Econ independent study adviser has ignored my last four emails (Don't even tell me you don't check your email at least twice a day, Professor Dye, not everyone fully understands the concept of inflation), I am about to take the most erudite final on the history of the planet (Including seven [7!!] ID essays, and the most vague final essay question on the plant -- What is Modernism?. Gee, I don't know, MV, YOU TELL ME!!), do all of my holiday shopping, say all my good-byes, and pack to return to my hell away from home, sunny Los Angeles, where an 80 degree not-so-white Christmas surely awaits. There was a time when I looked forward to December 25. A time when I didn't have to think about a billion things at once (No exaggeration) right before I opened my very last advent calender window, revealing the pseudo-stale, not so great chocolate-y treat.

Pardon the convoluted sentence structure. I just spent the last seven hours reading up on Woolf, Barnes, and Faulkner. My brain is a puddle.

However, I am inches away from three weeks of vacation bliss, where I will be snuggled under covers day in and day out enjoying (Gasp!) recreational reading and some mulled cider. I will also be ignoring my urge to check my grades every three seconds. Because Lord knows, this semester was a wash, leaving my GPA in the woods for dead.

If you're in the Los Angeles area, give me a ring. Remind me that the sun is shining outside (To my dismay). I'll be back in New York January 14, and believe me, my next chaotic semester couldn't come quickly enough, despite the fact that the proportional relationship between my stress/overcommittedness and sleep (More of the former, less of the latter, of course) is sure to skyrocket to epic, outer-worldly levels. Looking forward to the insanity.

The Luckiest

Wait, there's an actually holiday that celebrates eating an exorbitant amount of delicious food, AND everyone has to stop their bitching and complaining for an entire 24-hour period? Can you believe it!?

In the spirit of bwog, here are some things I am thankful for:

plimpton 11B
the girls from my floor last year
ben folds
my never ending supply of starbuck's markouts
when the lerner elevator is there when you call it
thursdays
fridays
saturdays
sunday rehearsals
the freezer section at appletree
feeling smart in my poetics class
original student theatre that doesn't require rights
new friends
7/10
food network
the latenite 11PM saturday show
cast bonding
impromptu dance parties
eating pancakes at tom's while sober
juniors (for not graduating yet)
my seniors
v113

Nothing to really complain about. My parents are paying for me to live in Manhattan with some of my best friends, and I don't have to work. I just go to school, go to rehearsal, and party to my heart's content. I'm so fucking lucky.

Gobble, gobble. Happy Thanksgiving.

I (Can't Commit To A Real Emotion) You

My always brilliant Poetics professor said something so intriguing to our class on Monday that I will be stopping the progress on my looming ten page Modernism paper (wait, progress? I meant procrastination. Whatever, those words share a lot of the same letters) to ponder it further.

The word "like" is a horrible word. It lacks commitment. It lacks transformation. I hate similes. They pervade bad poetry, and they don't create a concrete comparison because the author is unwilling to say that you are the sun to his heliocentric universe, only that you may or may not perhaps kinda resemble the sun to his heliocentric universe.

"I like you."

What does that even mean? Sure, it carries with it a positive connotation, but what else? I prefer you? I have interest in you? I hold some type of feeling that I'm unwilling to accept and therefore will not voice it for you? We have become so attached to this word "like" that we use it as a space filler, unable to trust our own word choice enough to eliminate it. We're so careful about what we say to other people that we can't even give them definitive accounts of what we ate for breakfast. (I, like, was too busy cramming for my French exam to even eat a, like, bagel.)

Okay. So. "I like you." It's more than scary to think about the other ways this sentiment can be expressed. "I love you." Too much commitment. "I care for you" Too maternal. "I lust for you." ...Probably the most accurate, but that can almost be just as bad.

"I'm interested in you. We should get to know each other better." We've become so attached to this word "like" and our "games" and we can't even commit to a sentence as simple as this. We are so scared of the complete vulnerability and transformation that occurs with the elimination of the word "like" that we would sooner live in the silence of our interest/love/lust than put that kind of commited statement out on the table.

Better to pine than commit to a real emotion.

I Do Everything

The rumors are true.

I got varsity.

!!

Fall Break My Spirit

(exhale)

Well, October, you were not my friend. Midterms, Melodrama, My Show Not Getting Rights...

You sucked.

But, lately, I've been looking on the bright side and balancing the whole thing. Producing TTB/Two Weeks was the best decision I have ever made, and one of the best college experiences I have had thus far. I have met some incredible people. I have never laughed or cried or partied as hard as I have these past two months. I am genuinely thankful that I had this opportunity.

That said, I'm looking forward to not working with MTI for a while.

Enter Varsity Show!

I'm interviewing for the Assistant Producer position in the next couple weeks. For whatever reason, I am so completely invested with the idea of being a part of 113. We can ignore the fact that I will also be producing LateNite more or less by myself, and that I will in all likelihood be on the NSOP 2007 Committee. And taking a full courseload. And figuring out how I'm studying abroad Spring 2008.

This weekend is Fall Break. I had every intention of spending every waking moment in Avery among the horribly pretentious Columbia grad students, but I went to Connecticut on a whim instead. Which resulted in one my favorite college memories. I can't think of a better group of people to spend time with. I really needed the time off, and I'm ready to face the rest of the semester (more or less) mentally intact.

It's hard to believe that Thanksgiving is already two weeks away. I'm already discussing Spring Break plans (cross-country road trip in a Winnebago). There's so much to look forward to. Including pit tickets to Death Cab and Ted Leo on Wednesday.

And for the first time in quite a while, I can say that I'm happy to be where I'm at. That's a good thing.

Positive Tension

"Erin, I'm not being negative. I'm not a pessimist - I'm a realist."

I like my glass half-full. Although I have the occasional bad day (or month) or a freakout, or two (or seventy), I fully subscribe to the notion that positive thinking leads to positive actions. If I honestly believe that I'm going to have a good day, I have a good day - it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. Never underestimate the power of positive thinking. Or negative thinking, for that matter. I mean, you wouldn't walk down the aisle to marry the man of your dreams all the while thinking, "This is going to end in divorce," would you?

Doors get shut. People say, "No." But I have faith in my ability as a solution-oriented to utilize my time for productivity, rather than moping around, eating a melty pint of Ben and Jerry's goodness. I try to surround myself with positive thinking people in order to reinforce my philosophy of persistent positivity.. However, lately, I have been hard-pressed to find people that aren't gaping into their half-empty glasses.

In theory, Columbia should be filled with bright, young, eager minds, willing to share the positive ideas and dreams with their fellow classmates, looking forward into the horizon of opportunity (yuck). In reality, you find the most competitive, whiny, self-absorbed, negative, under-caffeinated, overcommitted people you will ever encounter in your natural life. There is no room for positive thinking. There is only room for self-doubt, self-loathing, and the oh so popular Columbia favorite, self-deprecation. But when I ask, why so negative, I get the blanket response, "Silly, naive Erin, I'm a realist."

Since when does being a pessimist make you a realist? I consider myself a realist, but not if that means I have to be negative. I find it particularly unrealistic to think that things will inevitably end badly. I'm no cock-eyed optimist (in fact, I have very little in common with Ado Annie), but I can't understand how someone can walk through life sweating the small stuff (and it's all small stuff).

So, in conclusion, if you're finding your glass less than full, have some of mine, and try to think positively. It's brighter over here.

Background Noise

I remember when academics used to be the sun to my solar system; the wind to my sails; the fuel to my engine. These hyperbolic cliches are only necessary because, in high school, academics were my reason for everything. Because my one goal in life was getting into a great college, I allowed grades and tests and workbook pages to drive my motivation vehicle. However, it never occurred to me what would happen to my relationship with academia post-high school. Would I continue to study into the night and push friends aside to cram for an AP Calc exam? Would I actually need anti-derivative skills for my goals in life? And what were those subsequent goals that would supposedly lead to the best years of my life?

School has become the background noise to my life. Sure, I gave it the first two weeks so I could figure out how to balance my workload and buy all my books and gather my "good intentions," but, honestly, school is in no way my college focus. Perplexing, no?

Don't be mistaken. I do all my work, I'm not a slacker. If you've ever met me, you know that I have a tendency to stress about the fact that even though I took AP Calc in high school, I can't really do conversions or eighth grade math and will therefore stare at my obnoxiously yellow packet for three hours while holding a protractor, doing my Environmental Science lab homework and wondering which way is up (er, for example...).

I am finally making the transition from high school. I thought I would always be just "the overachiever." I never really thought about it last year as a freshman, but all my extracurricular overcommitments, my friends, my nights out -- those are the things that keep me going. It's not about getting a 4.0 and getting into an Ivy League school. I mean, what's after this? Real life, right? These things keep me going because those are the things that bring me joy, not my TI83.

College is teaching me to the think like a grown-up. Weird.

Weekend Update

You may be wondering where I wandered off to. Between classes and being a first-time producer and partying (a lot) I haven't had very much time to think, much less blog. So let's see if I can make sense of the past ten days or so, and you will all see that although I may have gone crazy, I have not yet fallen off the edge of the earth.

a. I may be taking 19 credits again this semester. I'm starting to think that if I don't have an exorbitant amount of reading to do that I think I don't have any work at all. (ie, I'm a masochist).

b. We finally cast our show. I am so utterly thrilled about our team now I want to squeal with delight.

c. Auditions were the nightmare I imagined them to be. We had twenty people audition the first night and sixty the second night. Callbacks were a breeze though, the people we cast might as well have been wearing signs with their roles around their necks when they walked in. Again, I want to squeal with delight.

d. I'm thrilled that I'm producing a show. It combines everything I love about creative vision and anal retentive organization. It might be my calling.

e. Although, I could go without the nightmares where the Lerner website Event Management System turns into a fire-breathing monster and tries to eat me in my sleep and I wake up realizing that I haven't slept in the past three days, and that I've just been hallucinating.

f. I completely forgot that for the Trust Entrepreneurial Internship Program I'm in, I have to set up an independent study with a sociology/women's studies professor so I can write a thesis this semester. Crap? I have to do this by Friday. Crap? Oh, shit?

g. There is a boy situation happening right now that is so grossly complicated I can't even convey to you the stress it is bringing to my life. Why, oh God, why? Don't you know that I'm taking 19 credits and trying to fight off imaginary space request monsters?

That's pretty much it.

Oh. and h. After not having a hangover from our first cast-bonding party last night, I'm pretty sure I'm incapable of getting one. This is a good thing.

Happiness is...

...sitting with eight of your favorite people at the Abbey Pub while singing Marvin Gaye's "Let's Get It On" into bottles of Magic Hat #9 at 1:00AM.

So, What Do You Do During The BlaZe?

No, friends, Columbia hasn't resorted to handing out free pot treats to the new first-years. It's the "new" CUnity, or the anti-CUnity, if you will. The BlaZe was probably the most fun I've had at college (sober) thus far. Hopefully I will snag some pictures from committee and the Bwog to showcase in the very near future. I was in charge of the "Make The NSOP Staffer Laugh" event, and committee members would just set up camp with me because my event was most awesome. Although, I saw way more naked freshman ass than I ever needed to see. Why do people think that by simply pulling down your pants I will fall down in stitches? Mooning is all in the delivery.

Will You Light My Candle?

I was given a truly amazing opportunity to commune with my fellow students and be a representative for my sophomore class by lighting the sophomore candle at the Barnard Convocation for the Class of 2010. For those of you who didn't go through some type of convocation during their orientation at college, it's basically an opportunity for administrators to prove that they're real people and not just a title to the students, and for all the students to be gathered together under the same roof (or in our case, gathered under a beautiful setup of lights and draped fabric that took about three hours, twenty people, and a lot of coffee to construct).

After a long day of helping first-years get moved into their doubles in the quad (in the pouring, humid rain, I might add), stuffing bags with programs and stuffed Barnard Bears for convocation, and frantically trying to memorize my lines for my College Night performance, I was ready for some meditation and communion with my fellow Barnard women that I have come to know and love, as well as the newest class to enter the iron gates at 115th and Broadway.

During bag stuffing, Danielle, who planned Convocation, asked Kate, Megan, and I to practice using the lighter we would be using to light our respective candles during the ceremony. It's the same kind I use at home to light the barbecue with, so I lit it with ease. I was so excited to be a part of this tradition - it was all really happening.

I sat through the ceremony, watched the alumni slideshow, and took it all in. I even teared up during Andi Grossman's speech, a graduate of 2006.

As Andi asked the Class of 2010, "What will your next four years mean for you?" I walked up to the candles set up on stage with Kate and Megan. Kate lit her candle as a representative for the senior class, Megan lit hers for the juniors, and after her wick was aflame, she handed me the lighter.

It was time. I lit the lighter, but nothing was happening. I tried again. As I was frantically trying to the light the green candle in front of me, my hands started to sweat, making the whole "spin and push" action required to make the lighter function all the more impossible.

Thirty seconds passed. I still could not break the genius code that guarded the key to unlocking this seemingly archaic device.

I finally caved the giggling in the audience among the freshman and peers was deafening. As was the thunderous applause I incurred when I lit the sophomore candle with the flame from the junior candle. You would think I had just won the Special Olympics.

Mortified. I can make the Dean's List, but I can't light a candle. Nice.

Lights Will Guide You Home

I leave for my island in two rivers in thirty short hours. And, I must say, for as much as I complained and moaned about the fact that I had to put my life on pause for three months, this was actually a completely and wholly worthwhile summer.

But, enough with that sentimental hooey. Get me the eff back to New York.

PS
...this is my nightmare...

My Hero: Kelly Clarkson

Kelly Clarkson is my hero for the following reasons:
1) Rocks out with Metal Skool
2) Drinks whiskey straight from the bottle
3) Is clearly hooking up with hot lead singer of Yellowcard
4) Sings Guns N Roses covers while plastered.

A Good Wife Always Knows Her Place

This was sent to me by a female coworker. Let the laughter ensue. Oh, you can click it to make it bigger if you don't have super-human zoom vision.

LA Has Made Me A Cynic. Ironic?

I don't really listen to the radio. Sure, I'll listen to Kevin and Bean in the morning from time to time, but after a while, their "Bush is soooo stupid" and "Oh, look, Ralph is doing another witty impression" and their complete lack of any musical spinnage (disc jockey? hello?) gets old. At my internship, I feel like I have to listen to the radio because the silence can be numbing, and I'm afraid to wear headphones in case there is any kind of toner disaster (upon which my headphones would become the sole obstacle preventing me from hearing the cries of the printer-in-distress and saving the day). Tangents aside, we listen to KIIS FM (or for all you folk fortunate enough not to live in the 818, 323, and beyond, the crap station that Ryan Seacrest does the weekly crap forty on, or whatever) to fulfill (term used loosely) any kind of musical needs we may have between clicks of keys. After hearing the same four songs looped over and over and over so many times that I think my brain my turn to mush and/or implode, I decided to finally take a stand against the musical abortion occurring on the Sony DiscPlayer, and change it to the old stand-by, Star 98.7.

I know what you're thinking. Star is the station listened to by wanna-be-cool parents and twenty-six-year-old-male processing clerks desperately searching for the next "cool jam" to chat about with their semi-attractive-female-co-workers while they flaunt their bed-head and burly man-scruff that is so 2005. Star is like VH1 -- it tries to be as cool as MTV, but for whatever reason falls short with their target demographic of tanorexic Laguna Beach partiers and thugged out guys who listen to "I'm going to shoot you between the eyes while you go down on me" rap in their size eighty pants their mom's bought at Macy's. On sale.

I digress. The analogy I have made (Star : VH1 as KIIS : MTV) brings me to my most valid of points. Who decided that MTV was cool? I mean, okay, secretly watching MTV when you were thirteen and learning everything your parents didn't want you to know about sex is one thing. But I can't bring myself to sit and watch MTV for hours on end like I used to. When I find a pre-Back-To-New-York Real World marathon or an episode of Road Rules (or, I will admit, my latest obsession Making The Band), sure, I'll sit and waste an afternoon. But all of the "reality" on MTV (which, if I remember correctly, does stand for Music Television) is just some self-indulgent crap-o-la exploited as a gateway by slutty contestants to get their paltry fifteen minutes. PS, you are not cool if you make out with a guy you just met if you know your boyfriend is watching. It does not make you bad-ass. MTV used to be about rebellion. Music was supposed to be our way to stick it to the man!

Well, VH1 fortunately provides an ample filler for any void created by the betrayal of mainstream music media vehicles on Generation Y (et tu, MTV?). Okay, it doesn't play music videos either except for waaaay into the wee hours of the morning when we come pouring ourselves into bed (a time, funnily enough, that would be ideal for reality television). However, at least their reality television doesn't take itself seriously. Reality television isn't entertainment. I could go outside and get the same effect. Okay, maybe there wouldn't be as many people mugging for the camera, but at least there wouldn't be any commercials. What makes VH1 reality entertaining is their ability to make fun of reality television. What would a world be like without Flavor of Love? My Sundays wouldn't be complete without watching Flava Flave manage sloppily makeout with a fabulously ghetto booty without his two-foot Movado hanging from his neck distracting him. If that's not magic, I'm not sure what is.

I'm not quite sure what spurred on this sudden urge to shake my fist at the folks at MTV. Maybe I've seen the video for Boulevard of Broken Dreams one too many times (why, Green Day, WHY!?). Maybe I've heard that piece of shit Panic! At the Disco song so many times I want to cry. Or, maybe I just like the fact that Star can always brighten my day with a little Blind Melon or Gin Blossoms action (the finest of nineties rock).

Or, maybe I've just been sulking in my bedroom in LA for too long. I always expected New York to make me a cynic. I think all the sunshine did me in.

The Key to Becoming a Successful Lawyer - A Kicky Voicemail

Part of my duties as an intern at Itel Media is going through the heaps (ha, right) of resumes and applications for a new hire. I came across a resume that looked perfect, but no sooner had I called to schedule an interview with him did I realize how wrong I had obviously been:

Hello, you've reached the law offices of Michael F. Schwartzberg. Since I don't have a secretary, you will have to leave a message. If I did have a secretary, she would be able to page me wherever I was and let me know that you called. ...I wish I was rich. Alright! Bye bye, now!

...

Needless to say, I didn't leave a message.

Death to ResLife

Okay, so Barnard Residential Life & Housing has officially made my "list"* of people and/or things I hate.

When my friends and I (out of sheer dumb luck) secured a beautiful eleventh floor Plimpton suite for the next year, we were beyond excited. Not only did we get to live with people we loved, we got to have some premium space to love each other in (air-conditioning? breakfast nook? views of buildings twenty feet away? is there anything it doesn't have?). One of our friends, to our deep dismay, decided not to return to Barnard next year and is transferring to Kenyon. We had known about this previous to her decision, so we contacted ResLife** to discuss this hypothetical situation in the case that it should theortically arise. Which it did.

Luckily (well not really for her) another very good friend was on the housing wait-list, and BAM all of our problems were over. Not only did we have another loveable person to live in our suite (because Phish can never be replaced), she would also know where she was living in the fall and that she would be living loveable people.***

We contacted ResLife and let them know our plan. We wrote letters/emails, made phone calls, set up meeting, etc. We did everything we could possibly do to make everyone's lives easy. And happy. And full of love.

BUT NO! ResLife clearly wants no such happiness for anyone. Not even themselves.****

Apparently, it's better for everyone to put a complete stranger in our suite and stick our wait-list friend in a double with someone she already knows she can't live with (long story). It's like they went out of their way to piss everyone off. Because that's what they do at Barnard Residential Life & Housing. They sit and plot with their clock pens and try and figure out the best plan to make everyone unhappy. In the end, I mostly feel bad for the stranger they're sticking us with. Because let's face it. My friends and I are a bunch of freaks.*****

*In high school, my friends made me keep a list of the people I was actively hating so I wouldn't hate more than five people at a time. This was to keep me from being a complete and utter bitch, and also to save my intense hatred reserves for the people who really deserved it.
**In March. We contacted them in March. Months of hoop-jumping ensued.
***And who doesn't appreciate love and security?
****Or at least they won't be happy with themselves on Monday when they recieve the onslaught of my death threat arsenal that I have been preparing in the past few hours
*****ie sexy troll themed parties, calling each other by our true medieval titles, and worshipping a stuffed purple Totoro.

New Obsession: David Hockney

I'm not going to lie. I didn't like my art history survey course I took last semester. No, that's a lie. I really hated it. I hated how it was disorganized, my TA was clueless, my discussion section was useless, and we skipped some of my favorite artists (um, hi, Van Gogh? Magritte? Hello?) However, despite my abhorrance (take that SAT flashcards you said would never come in handy) of that dreadful class (okay, now I'm British), I still love going to museums and seeing new art and old faves.

I had never heard of Hockney before I was driving down Santa Monica Blvd on my way to the Troubadour and saw the banners erected on consecutive lamp-posts wedged between the infamous palms. I was struck by the Gogh-like strokes and the bright technicolor paint of the portrait of an older portly man in a gaudy Hawaiian shirt. I made it my mission to visit the exhibit at LACMA and learn more of this man.

I went on Sunday with my mom. I was completely blown away. David Hockney represents everything I love about art (spontaneity, passion, imperfection, the intimacy of the relationship between viewer/painter/subject, the way it can encapsulate a moment perfectly), and he completely rejects everything I loathe (the installation of fear in the subject, making the viewer feel inconsequential, perfect "by the book technique). His portraits were magnificent: bright colors, clear motion, a moment brilliantly captured, but forever changing. I was drawn into every painting, curious about the subject, and also very aware of its relationship to the world and to Hockney himself. Though the paintings are so much about that painter/subject relationship, I can't help but also feel part of the equation, as I find myself relating so much to the subject. It was incredible.

I leave you with my favorite piece in the collection, an attempt to capture a moment with Polaroids, but defying the photographic convention that this medium must appear static - The Scrabble Game