Heathkit Hero and Hero Jr. Robots

Here's a Heathkit Hero 1 with arm

And Hero Jr. with many cartridges
Among its myriad functions, "The robot can guard the user’s home against intruders and will give a verbal warning and ask for a password when the sensors detect an intruder."

Got some $$ to spare?

If I did, I'd buy one of these really terrific original posters for Alexandro Jodorowsky's The Holy Mountain.

French - 47 x 63

Italian - 39 x 55

U.S. - 27 x 41

Bob & Me

When I was a kid I expected to be viciously attacked and probably murdered by a man named Bob, the demon spirit from the TV show Twin Peaks, the denim clad sneering demon spirit with dirty long hair who killed Laura Palmer.

Twin Peaks came out in April of 1990 when I was 11 years old. From the first episode my family gathered 'round and watched this crazy ass show. We loved it, it was probably the only time we all watched TV together. This now seems strange to me. I mean, my dad would change the station if there was kissing or a butt in a bikini going on, but he didn't mind me being subjected to the pathological creepiness of Twin Peaks. Rape and murder were A-OK. Bob's "death bag" was family entertainment.

An episode would end, my parents would say okay guys time for bed, I'd head back to my room filled with a gnawing, sick dread. The hall to my room was the hall to Laura Palmer's room, my room was Laura's room. Of course, I was convinced Bob would be stopping by for a visit. So I was forced to develop a complex, exhausting ritual (exhausting being the key word here because I'd have to be totally exhausted to approach sleep, and this way of exhausting myself by compulsively fiddling around stayed with me for a long time): the sheets had to be a certain way, so did the bedspread, they both had to be pulled up to my eyes, just so I could see through the gloom. Above all the position of my body had to be perfect--on my left side, facing the doorway, my legs together and bent at the knees at an exact 45 degree angle. There are many details that I can no longer remember. I think there was some counting involved. Yes, there was definately some counting involved. Like: If I could slowly count all the way to thirty I could relax a bit. And if I could make the count to sixty, well, maybe I'd live to see another day, maybe even another week and another Twin Peaks episode. I know my stuffed animal friends took watch around me. Maybe I even fluffed my pillow, and if it wasn't exact in its fluffiness, maybe I'd fluff some more and more. No no, that's only what I do now, back then it didn't factor in, it couldn't protect me a bit. Yes, my fiance calls me Fluffy.

Ritual complete, I did not move, I barely breathed, silence is important. This is life or death here.

Would Bob come from the foot of the bed or from the side? I'd usually keep an eye on the foot, that's where he hung out as far as I knew. Emotions I couldn't pin down ran through my brain, emotions that lasted through to the next morning, especially when I had to take a shower before school.

It got so bad that I was forced to take my showers with the curtain drawn. I was sick of peeking out every five seconds, I had to be ready. Bob could strike at any time. But then I was forced to look into the bathroom mirror. If you know Bob, you know mirrors are really fucking scary.

After these showers I'd dry off my freaked-out pre-pubescent self and have to go to school. 6th grade. Were there other 6th graders wandering the halls like me? I wondered. I still wonder. (Though obviously there were some kids suffering from REAL problems)

When Twin Peaks finally ended after the half-baked season two, you'd think I'd be able to move on, that the fear would lessen--it didn't. Bob was still out there, somewhere, he was looking for a new body, and I believed, fully and totally, that that body was me.

Republic Pictures posters

If you ever want to get an original vintage 1940s/50s movie poster that hardly no one else has, of a movie that probably no one has ever seen, one that will look great on your wall and is relatively cheap, I recommend seeking out those from Republic Pictures releases.

The art is almost always over the top and pretty amateurish, but that's what makes these posters so endearing!

I've owned this one, "A Strange Adventure" (1954), for a while. It's on sale for $5.95 on eBay right now!!! Notice the fistfight going on in the background, along with a bloody man facedown in the snow. If they had the chance, Republic would depict a nice fistfight.

Here are some others I've found on the net:

Canadian Mounties vs. Atomic Invaders (1953)

Federal Agents vs. Underworld, Inc. (1949)

Drums of Fu Manchu (1940)

Ghost Riders of the West (1954)

The Man is Armed (1956)

Mysterious Dr. Satan (1940)

Panther Girl of the Kongo (1955)

Radar Patrol vs. Spy King (1949)

Scandal, Inc. (1956)

Secret of the Purple Reef (1960)

The Woman They Almost Lynched (1953)

Young and Wild (1958)

Mountain Moonlight (1941)

Dreams

My dreams are coming back to me. I am dreaming again. And that's good, it means I'm not using drugs or consuming vast amounts of alcohol like I have in the past.

I keep a journal of my dreams, the significant ones, I'm not the first to do so, and if you read them through you'd likely think I was crazy or special. I like to think I'm special.

The value of dreams is debatable, it's constantly debated or cherished or tossed off by one theoretician or another. For me, my dreams have great value, inspiration. They often make me very happy--casting a light on my day, even many days--or very depressed, sending me back into the darkness. They make me think. I can only hope the same for you.

I've been recording my dreams for nine years. Here's last night's three part dream and the dream from nine years previous, the first entry in my journal, as they are, unedited:

July 18 2003 - look out window (dorm?)->group of black people->see me and chuck tons of stones, breaking many of my windows...tell Dad, he comes over, go down street + approach (same?) group, he ends up shooting one.

July 18 2012 - (1) Indoors, I think I see/hear ghost outside, maybe in the garage. Then it starts raining wildly. A heavy trickle of water comes into living room from ceiling, then from places all over house. I'm afraid house will cave in, be flooded; rush upstairs, calling for Henri, but can't find him.

(2) I'm Jim Morrison; I walk through the crowd, go backstage. Certain forces impair my ability to walk, I crawl along against gravity, ask people to help/push me forward. I just want to get to the stage. Meanwhile I score a couple nickle bags of weed. Another dude hands me a couple of his 'special' joints, which are horribly rolled--very loose, they go up in flame and I barely get high.

(3) Manager Chris giving me ride home in p/u truck. We're talking, he mentions he comes from area where I know Mothman Prophesies to be from--I ask if he's read it + he gets a weird look, like he doesn't want to talk about it. I ask again + then look out the windshield, up into the sky ahead of us--I notice an orangish speck flying up there. Then the speck/ball divides into three, these fly off in different directions. I ask Chris to stop car + get out. I see another up there + it acts the same way--they travel fast. I ask Chris + he's seen them too. We're in a housing dev. + I notice 3-4 adults conversing in front of a garage. I go over + ask if they've seen anything in the sky + they have! It seems the whole neighborhood's abuzz. By this time I notice Chris has driven off, leaving me stranded. I go into a house, come across some Hollywood directors/producers all laying around a room, they know me. I talk w/ them. Go outside--it's the 1970's, I'm in Hollywood Hills. There's a scooter-thing by the curb up the street + I get on + ride off clunkily, go up a hill. I still think I see those specks in the sky. They seem to be all over up there. I turn around, go back down hill--owner of scooter is waiting. I hand it over to a girl, explain how it works (brakes are testy, etc.), she drives off. Owner points to cup on ground, suggests I drop some change in there + leaves. I drop in some change for her troubles.

poem 2

poem

My favorite fifty directors

To mark the passing of Andrew Sarris a couple weeks back, here's an alphabetically arranged list of my fifty favorite directors (I know I've forgotten to include many)along with my preferred movie from each. Andrew Sarris liked lists and I like Andrew Sarris. Long live lists, and death to bad lists (like those found weekly in Entertainment Weekly--see July 1 issue, which, btw, I'm only aware of because my fiancee sometimes brings it home, and I sometimes peruse it while taking my morning dumps).

Altman, Robert - 3 Women (1977)

Antonioni, Michaelangelo - Il Grido (1957)

Araki, Gregg - Mysterious Skin (2004)

Bergman, Ingmar - Smiles of a Summer Night (1955)

Blier, Bertrand - Un, deux, trois, soleil (1993)

Bunuel, Luis - The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972)

Bresson, Robert - Diary of a Country Priest (1951)

Cassavetes, John - The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (1976)

Chaplin, Charles - The Circus (1928)

Corman, Roger - Masque of the Red Death (1964)

Dante, Joe - Gremlins (1984)

Eastwood, Clint - Gran Torino (2008)

Fassbinder, Rainer Werner - Satan's Brew (1976)

Ferreri, Marco - I Love You (1985)

Fellini, Federico - La Dolce Vita (1960)

Ford, John - Steamboat Round the Bend (1935)

Forman, Milos - Taking Off (1971)

Fuller, Sam - The Naked Kiss (1964)

Griffith, D.W. - Broken Blossoms (1919)

Hartley, Hal - Trust (1990)

Hawks, Howard - Only Angels Have Wings (1939)

Herzog, Werner - Signs of Life (1968)

Hitchcock, Alfred - Strangers on a Train (1951)

Jodorowsky, Alejandro - The Holy Mountain (1973)

Kaurismaki, Aki - Shadows in Paradise (1986)

Korine, Harmony - Gummo (1997)

Kubrick, Stanley - A Clockwork Orange (1971)

Lang, Fritz - House by the River (1950)

Laughton, Charles - The Night of the Hunter (1955) -- (I know this was his only
directorial effort, but who cares)

Lubitsch, Ernst - The Shop Around the Corner (1940)

Lynch, David - Blue Velvet (1986)

Malick, Terrence - Badlands (1973)

McCarey, Leo - Love Affair (1939)

Ophuls, Max - La Plaisir (1951)

Ray, Nicholas - Rebel Without a Cause (1955)

Renoir, Jean - La Grande illusion (1937)

Resnais, Alain - Hiroshima mon amour (1959)

Rivette, Jacques - Va savior (2001)

Rohmer, Eric - Love in the Afternoon (1972)

Rossellini, Roberto - Viaggio in Italia (1954)

Suzuki, Seijun - Youth of the Beast (1963)

Sternberg, Josef von - The Devil is a Woman (1935)

Tarkovsky, Andrei - Solaris (1972)

Terayama, Shuji - Pastoral: To Die in the Country (1974)

Truffaut, Francois - The Man Who Loved Women (1977)

Veber, Francis - La Chevre (1981)

Welles, Orson - The Lady From Shanghai (1947)

Wertmuller, Lina - Love and Anarchy (1973)

Wilder, Billy - The Apartment (1960)

Zemeckis, Robert - Back to the Future (1985)

arthur

GPK

A couple of the more expensive Garbage Pail Kids items up for bid on eBay right now.

time to paint

album of the week - Arzachel (1969)

Dark, melodic and heavy psych by four guys who'd go on to be huge parts of the progressive Canterbury scene. Steve Hillage later played with Kevin Ayers and Gong before switching into ambient/electronic meditation mode. Keyboardist Dave Stewart and the rest then formed Egg. Arzachel was actually named Uriel, but then Hillage left to go back to school, the LP eventually came out in 1969 and carried the name "Arzachel"...who knows. Some dude on allmusic.com claims it was "recorded in an unknown cavern in eastern Ukraine." "Azathoth" and "Queen St. Gang" stick out as absolute classics of late 1960's psych/prog.

androgynous being

Mazz - Personal Best 1

I found this CD in the clearance section of a CVS store quite a few years back. For $1.25, I just couldn't pass it up.

Here are a couple of other Mazz CD covers, including the sought-after Personal Best 2

Dream Group

That's me in the background, facing away with my head turned back to the camera, when I was 11.

graffito

Graffito of the temple interior, Temple of Mnajdra, Malta.

John Sinclair/MC5/Ann Arbor

A couple weeks ago I stumbled upon a treasure trove-like exhibit being held at the downtown Ann Arbor Public Library, commemorating 40 years since the "Free John Now" rallies, the rallies that helped get that big ape John Sinclair out of prison.

The exhibit included the rarest of the rare involving not just Sinclair and his rather laughable White Panther Party, but the MC5, the beginnings of the Ann Arbor Food Co-Op, lots and lots of photos and posters featuring places that no longer exist; Ann Arbor history, Michigan history, Ann Arbor and Michigan music history, and the history of rock and roll in general.

Here are some highlights:

I'd never even seen a copy of this before. The only reason I'd even heard it was because of the Up Anthology put out 15 or so years ago.

That's the Up in the basement of 1520 Hill Street. I once took a few English literature classes with the vocalist Frank Bach (Diedenbach) at Wayne State University. This was in 2001 or 2002, not 1968, and Frank was wearing a Mackinac Island emboidered sweatshirt with, I think, a collared shirt underneath. He is a very nice, calm man.

There's also a photo of Frank holding his baby next to a tall pot plant. And there are a lot of interesting newspaper articles, notes, even a strange telegram stating: Dear John, Congratulations to you, Bob Tyner and the MC5 for making time. The rest of the country deserves the opportunity to dig the MC5-Zenta-Experience. If in any way I can help you, please count me in. Stand firm of the three pillars. Jerry Campbell

Somewhere I read that Frank is a master chef, the house chef of 1520 Hill Street (post-MC5), a master of microbiotics.

Another rare 45.

From early 1966 posters for some long-gone Ann Arbor club...


...to 1971 Hill Auditorium line-up featuring Pink Floyd, Parliament Funkadelic.

Then there's Leni Sinclair's photo of the Grateful Dead playing in the West Park bandshell, August 13 1967.

I left the library thinking of all the energy it took it create all that stuff, all the funny ideas, the in-your-face ness of it, no matter what it really amounted to. The action, that's what impresses me most.

yard rink

This is the rink I made the past few days out of things I found in my garage: various pieces of wood, ceiling tiles, a tarp. It is 2.5" at its shallowest.