Notes on public safety, during three minute address to Council tonight

Posted on August 18, 2014 by markweiss86
Larry Klein, at 7:45 tonight, approximately ten minutes after his 3 minute nap

Larry Klein, at 7:45 tonight, approximately ten minutes after his 3 minute nap

>>Seemless transition from neighborhood preparedness to public safety

Gunn, Paly and Castilleja –aspire to community service

We can self-govern and self-police.

No outsourcing. No privatizing.

Background:

1. 2011 ballot Measure D affecting collective bargaining agreement (CBA) and binding arbitration

A recent regional panel said we had some improprieties in how we passed the Measure

Link to Palo Alto Weekly recent story.

Public employment relations board, 53-page ruling.

2. Gunn “graffiti hate crime case”

I find fault with:

a. media, Chris Kenrick of Palo Alto Weekly

b. public safety, PAPD, Sgt. Zach Perron spokesman

c. schools — should have kept it in-house

They flared the flames of racism and classism and sensationalized this story.

3. Recent reports, out of Ferguson, Missouri, especially in The New York Times, Elizabeth R. Beavers and Michael Shank, about militarization of public safety.

(The authors are actually policy researchers and activists, not Times staff)

Also, in November, 2011, Palo Alto outsourced our crossing guards to American Guard Services, a very militarized firm, and all they did was hire back the same guards and make them work for less. I had written a letter to Weekly asking City Attorney cancel that contract and put it to re-bidding.

Link to Safe Routes to Schools, which mentions ACG. I may send this to PAPD and PAUSD people in charge.

I am interested in reaching out across the creek in one direction or the other (and here I gestured with my hand in two directions, with a shaking motion) such that we work together for our mutual safety but that is not the same as pooling resources to hire or outsource this kind of thing.

Larry Klein took the 3 minutes to either fixate on his fly or perhaps trying to remember his mantra; he certainly did not do me the courtesy of looking at me, and did not seem to listen to me. Previously I have noticed him taking the opportunity to relieve himself when it was my turn to speak, leaving the table, we presume to go and use the facilities. If he gets within earshot tonight, I am going to call him on it.

I should probably explicate what I actually said here.

ABOVE, WHAT I SAID, BELOW, WHAT I HEARD (ABOUT PARKS AND LEE PROPERTY)

I am writing this while attending the meeting. About 7:35 p.m. or 20 minutes later. Council is covering their respective asses on the 7.7 acre of Lee Property donated to City years ago, but never dedicated, and the subject of the Arrillaga power play, described in Grand Jury Report of June, 16, 2014. Four areas where fences are off the line by 8 to 12 feet — in which way? Chain link, covered with black vinyl plastic “and I expect will be replaced” Greg Betts. Whose fences? Neighbors. Holman.

Scharf: let’s celebrate this.

see also: Acterra has some plants there.

also: Peter Drekmeir, former Bay Area Action / Acterra leader and former mayor, did he have an inkling on the impropriety of the usage, for 20 years, and overlapping his terms?

Betts: artist in residence use? Like Sarah Cameron Sunde, communing with ants? There is no irrigation, and it would take about $500,000 to add sprinklers. There is a parks public outreach and planning “EIG?” – he will refer to them.

I am going to text Peter Drekmeier and ask him to call me on this topic. Acterra there since 2005. Kniss: this place is like a dust bowl now. (She has a property very near, she and Dick Kniss, a Williamson Property, I recall, plus she mentioned it once during campaign, 2012.

Schmid, 7:45, concerned about 8.5 foot chain link fence, Arrillaga put on public land, and can we get him to take it down?

edit to add: while editing this to add the links, meanwhile listening with one ear to discussion of parking technology and “loops”, I realized that I had written a version of this on Weekly comment board, earlier today:

I was one of only 50 Palo Altans willing to put their name on a defense of our public safety workers, NO on D at the time.

I would like to see a more thorough discussion of these issues.

I look at this in context of Fergusson, Missouri and the recent, in New York Times discussion of militarization of our public safety.

By Elizabeth R. Beavers

Web Link

I think we should self-govern, with leadership this is reflective of and listens to rank-and-file citizens, and a type of self-policing that expands neighborhood preparedness into something that de-specilizes public safety — so certainly DO NOT out-source or privatize. I want to see people from Gunn and Paly (and I guess Casti) grow up to help keep us safe.

I think leadership in 2011 was taking orders from a non-elective cabal of right-wingers, arguably the same people who push for too much development.

I do not think our working class should be scape-goated for our problems.

That being said, I am skeptical about organized labor, and its leadership.

Thanks to the men and women in blue (and sometimes pink) for keeping us safe!

I appreciate the signed comments by our neighbors who disagree with this (pro-worker) viewpoint, however. Let’s talk about it!

Like the Grand jury report of June 16, 2014 this is sign of a leadership crisis here.

edit to add, an hour later: Larry got up, presumably to pee, at around 9.

edit to add, the next day: I caught up to Liz Kniss, City Council member and former Santa Clara County Supervisor, and she clarified: her property on Page Mill is not adjacent to that of Arrillaga; if she mentioned Arrillaga as “my neighbor” she meant their respective properties in town per se; she said something about her husband doing HAM radio, up on Page Mill. She and Nancy Shepherd had toured he site in question, the 7.7 acre parcel the Lee Family donated to City for rec use years ago but finally Monday we added to park inventory, after Arrillaga had used it as a loading area for work on his own adjacent compound and tried to buy it from us, secretly, for $175,000. Also, Peter Drekmeier and I traded brief emails on this, because he is a BAA/Acterra alum and former Mayor. Acterra has a nursery up there, which may or may not be continued with the new designation. I am holding my place here about Larry Klein and his bladder, tacky as it may be (my stance, not his bladder). I sent a copy of this to his work email address plus a little note about whether he was intending to look like he could care less when I talk to council.

edit to add: November 26: the search function leads me here, maybe
cuz i miss-spell the italian word for writing on the walls, but somehow appropriate I just posted to PAW under an article about public safety staff texting a photo of a scantily clad suspect asking Weekly to re-open its report on “gunn graffiti hate crime” here known as “gunn graffiti” as a tag no less, thusly, but please not above that I guess I did in August speak to the world for 3 minutes linking this May 2014 Palo Alto case to Feguson MO:
Hey i’m still looking for traction regarding the PD’s inflammatory statements about an alleged but actually bogus “graffiti hate crime” at Gunn, May, 2014 (the one that started with “Thank God…”). You and several other news sources fanned the flames of racism and invited speculation on your anonymous comments boards.

Don’t get me wrong: I support Chief Dennis Burns and our generally excellent public safety staff here. But we do demand excellence.

Why don’t your report a follow up on the May, 2014 cold-case non-case and own up to your end of it.

If I did not have a meticulous habit of signing 234 of 235 posts to PAW I would have posted under NOBODYS PREFECT

I also spell “ferguson” fergusen I will add the correct and leave the incorrect.

and just for yucks or yuck i clicked on “sex” as category

Posted in media, Plato's Republic, sex | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

There’s a little piece of Maria in every song he sings

Posted on August 18, 2014 by markweiss86
This is a photo of a tv screen in LA last weekend, of Berkeley kid, Adam Duritz, the voice of my generation. But what's that thing alighted on his noggin?

This is a photo of a tv screen in LA last weekend, of Berkeley kid, Adam Duritz, the voice of my generation. But what’s that thing alighted on his noggin?

When I worked, as a freelancer or go-fer, at Goodby Berlin and Silverstein, 921 Front Street in San Francisco in the late 1980s there was an interesting looking lady there about my age named Maria. I seem to recall that one day she said there was some chalk graffiti in front of the office that said “I love you, Maria”. Something makes me wonder if this is the Maria the muse of several Counting Crows songs. Keep in mind that Adam Duritz is about my age and would have been some kind of starving artist, under-achieving bougie or under-employed malcontent, as I was. Also, another GBS peon of the time, Pammie Laws later got signed to Warner with Seven Day Diary.

(But of course I also thought that Steve Jenkins of Third Eye Blind was J.T. Leroy based on the fact that his best friend in 7th grade at Terman Junior High in Palo Alto in 1976 was John Leroy…on the other hand, according to Kevin Ryan of Green Apple Books in SF, Margaret Cho worked there either simultaneous to me or just before me, in 1989..also, two former girlfriends of mine, A_____ and C_____ both knew Adam, either from UC Berkeley or the Bear’s Lair / Himalayans days. It is said that Steve Jenkins’ brother, George Jenkins, now a collegiate woman’s rowing coach was Adam’s fraternity brother at not Berkeley but UC Davis and he introduced A.D. to Steve, whose band opened for Crows at the Fillmore. And Patty Spiglanin of The Naked Barbie Dolls is often seen backstage at Crows on the strength of the fact that two of her band members left to join Adam’s crew. And my cousin Craig Ruda — Eric Cohen, who took the above pictures last weekend asked me this — was bass player in Joe 90, on Adam’s E Pluribus / Geffen imprint, and sang backing vocals on “Hanging Around”. And my client Stew opened for Counting Crows on 10 dates East Coast sheds, Great Woods, Saratoga, Holmdel, Jones Beach — I t.m.’d those dates. So my guess about Maria is not totally stab in dark. I am the rain king. Yeahhh.)

Counting Crows at Greek Theatre Los Angeles August and everything after 15, 2014 photo and review by Eric Cohen: we met the crows guitarist the night before at a party; going to counting crows concert tonight, what is the name of your cousin who played with joe 90 (Craig Ruda); (will you review the show for plasty?) Possible I’m not qualified a fan; (did they play round here)yes. that’s a good dog. a good song. Hanging around? I don’t think so.but that is also a good one. (he later sent a link to setlist dot com which does not list it — he was correct)
Thanks Eric

crowsLA2014

Posted in ethniceities, la la, sex, sf moma | Leave a comment

Rue-DOOR-en felt the most real so we GOOG-led it and found a section of an island in Finland that we someday hope to claim as ancestral homeland

Posted on August 16, 2014 by markweiss86

(TRIBUTE TO BIG DAYS OF JOSEPH ZIRKER, SARAH CAMERON SUNDE, THEIR FAMILIES AND FRIENDS, AUGUST 14-15, 2014 PALO ALTO AND SAN FRANCISCO)

I do not know Jodi Wilgoren also known as Jodi Rudoren. Her sister Debbi Wilgoren was three years behind me at Dartmouth which means my roommate Scott Rafshoon probably trained her as a reporter at the Daily D. Debbi writes for the Post while Jodi writes for the Times.

I stole these three jpegs about art and artists in the Gaza Strip. The headline above comes from an article Jodi wrote about coining a name using her and Gary’s names.

garzARat

This is a weird post. I’m at Starbucks on El Camino, at Stanford Aveune, the former Mountain Mike’s Pizza building, and wanted to do about an hour of “work”, before showering, changing and heading back to Terry’s. I am pasting in here the photo Terry took of Joe Zirker and 12 others Thursday, that Sal Pizarro of the Mercury used with his column, at least online. (It is fair use for me to drag a photo my girlfriend took from the Mercury to “Plastic Alto”; meanwhile I have a set of about 30 shots of the same event I will edit and post here as well. I may try to sneak a link to that into the comments under Sal’s item about Joe.

photo by Terry Acebo Davis

photo by Terry Acebo Davis

Scott and I walked Ace from Barron Park to Mitchell Park and back. We stopped for about a half hour to hear the Mads Tolling Quartet play. I greeted Mads before the hit, having been seated next to him for a show at Stanford a week ago. I was pleasantly surprised that his band included Ila Cantor on guitar, someone I had met in New York in 2004, and greeted her, as well.

Child art from Gaza published in New York Times

Child art from Gaza published in New York Times

On my way to Smith-Andersen to pay down my art tab, I detoured to a drive-way sale in Professorville. Something tipped me off that this was the house of Jason Peery, the Pinewood High basketball coach whose family foundation donated the new gym at Paly High. Sure enough, Mrs. Peery introduced me to her husband and then I also met Jason Fung, who happened by in his vintage muscle car. He said he remembered Joey Piziali (my favorite late 1990s Paly player) and we exchanged some friendly smack talk about him. Jason succeeds the great Earl Hanson as Athletic Director at Paly. He kindly posed for Plastic Alto:

Paly grad, longtime staffer and new AD Jason Fung, at Jason Peery's yard sale, summer 2014

Paly grad, longtime staffer and new AD Jason Fung, at Jason Peery’s yard sale, summer 2014

Jodi Rudoren became Jerusalem bureau chief of The New York Times in May, 2012, after 14 years as a reporter and editor at the paper. She previously served as the paper’s Education Editor, deputy Metropolitan editor and Chicago bureau chief.

Darcie and Daina of the Oak Creek Club staff lent me a pen and gave me a piece of paper to make some quick notes about Times stories Friday I hope(d) to delve into.

This headline today made me re-route:

Artists’ Work Rises From the Destruction of the Israel-Gaza Conflict

khaledArt

Liligul and her yorkies were stretching their respective or collective what is it 22 legs which sounds rather Louise Bourgious when I came upon her.

liligulAndDogs

There was a distinct Norge tinge to my Friday, seeing Liligul and then proceeding directly to what became a 6.5 mission to support Sarah Cameron Sunde; car to apartment, bike to train, Caltrain to Aquatics Park and then in reverse. For Sarah, she spend upwards of 12 hours in the Bay charting artistically the ebb and flow of the water. Einer Sunde her father joined in for part of the stint. A collaborator named Winnie the film producer from Oakland included me in a sub-ritual, a symbol dance we performed around 2:26.

A pretty young hostess at Reposado Restaurant in Palo Alto

A pretty young hostess at Reposado Restaurant in Palo Alto

Artist from Gaza depicted in The New York Times today, article by Jodi Rudoren formerly known as Jodi Wilgoren, whose sister overlapped with me at the Daily Dartmouth, in 1985

Artist from Gaza depicted in The New York Times today, article by Jodi Rudoren formerly known as Jodi Wilgoren, whose sister overlapped with me at the Daily Dartmouth, in 1985

Ace made a friend, after a while, they called him Ollie. Ollie is black while Ace is a mix, of black and white, more white I would think. They started playing and, to be honest, for a second there I thought it would get out of hand and Ace might get hurt. Then we all went to hear the music, which you could not hear from the dog run, until you got past a truck playing music to a group of what looked like Oceanic Islanders at one of the reserve barbecue areas. When I noticed the female guitarist, a rarity, my mind flipped thru a short list of possible identities and I did think of Ila, although it had been more than 10 years since we met, but I had seen a notice about her and sent her a greeting via email. When Mads introduced his band, he said this was the first time he and Ila had played together. The Zidane song was not in the set list.

Ila Cantor guitar goddess August 2014 Palo Alto Mitchell Park with Mads Tolling Quintet

Ila Cantor guitar goddess August 2014 Palo Alto Mitchell Park with Mads Tolling Quintet

I hugged and kissed Eva Zirker hello but did not spend much time with her, having seen she and Joe the night before (and Joe the night before that). Eva's daughter Karen Jo I had met several times, at opening and birthdays, but did not speak to that night -- I sprang away early to try to catch Charlie Chan at the Olympics, at Stanford Theatre. I did speak to Karen's grand-daughter, Chamisa or Charmisa, at length and she posed for me, I posted below.

I hugged and kissed Eva Zirker hello but did not spend much time with her, having seen she and Joe the night before (and Joe the night before that). Eva’s daughter Karen Jo I had met several times, at opening and birthdays, but did not speak to that night — I sprang away early to try to catch Charlie Chan at the Olympics, at Stanford Theatre. I did speak to Karen’s grand-daughter, Chamisa or Charmisa, at length and she posed for me, I posted below.

A good portion of my Friday (Freya-day)was devoted to Sarah Cameron Sunde and her performance piece 36.5, in San Francisco, at Aquatics Park, in the shadow of Ghiradeli Square. I left Scott’s at 11 a.m. determined to get my bike and I to the 11:41 train, which I made by 3 minutes, plus the 3 minute delay announced. A detour of about an hour to help a traveler find the Golden Gate Transit stop had me arriving at the North Point spot of the show at around 2:20, and I was immediately corralled into playing a small support role by Winnie Wong, an Oakland based film producer, whose boyfriend Dan at that point was running an errand out to the water to help Sarah. Einer Sunde, proud papa, was himself neck-high in the project at that point; today he told me his duration was about an hour. I scribbled something about “My bonnie lies over the mountain” into a comments book, then headed back, via Embarcadero green bike lanes, to catch the 4:09 express. I sat with Jim Keene, Palo Alto’s City Manager, who happened to be in the City, and rode with me as far as Millbrae. I dubbed her Queen Sarah Freya-Day, after the Pee Wee Herman side-show and Chapel Hill rock band.

While I compose all this, "Water of Love" by dire straits flows from the coffee house speakers; not sure what this photo says about the totality of the Sarah Cameron Sunde piece "36.5" other than that I was there for a tick of a clock and snap of a shutter.

While I compose all this, “Water of Love” by dire straits flows from the coffee house speakers; not sure what this photo says about the totality of the Sarah Cameron Sunde piece “36.5” other than that I was there for a tick of a clock and snap of a shutter.

L I K E T H I S

Carmisa wondered if the couple depicted in this Joe Zirker piece were his parents (her great-great-grand-parents)

Carmisa wondered if the couple depicted in this Joe Zirker piece were his parents (her great-great-grand-parents)

Joe Zirker actually asked me to shoot his show, both the art and the people, and I complied with about 34 shots before it got dark enough that my camera starts to automatically use a flash, and I stopped. That plus I had promised myself I would leave at 7 to catch Charlie Chan at the Olympics.

Joe and Eva’s grand-daughter Carmisa (I hope I am spelling that) started telling me her work and study in social justice. I wanted to counter with a description of the so-called Gunn graffiti hate crime. I’d like her take on what the heck that was all about here — I am resting my case that the First Amendment carries despite efforts by the school, the press and the spokesperson for PAPD to fan the flames of racism and classism here.

Ok, Joe, you deserve better than someone to hijack your event for political agendas, even ones you or your family might agree with. In fact Joe Zirker in honor of his show, and his 90th birthday, deserves 90 actual art critics to see and write on this set. I will try, therefore, to send this post to 90 art writers and bloggers. Maybe Joe Oliveira can forward this to Peter Selz, who we saw (and I shot) recently at Cantor and WCC.

Carmisa wondered if the couple depicted in this Joe Zirker piece were his parents (her great-great-grand-parents)

Carmisa wondered if the couple depicted in this Joe Zirker piece were his parents (her great-great-grand-parents)

Palo Alto former art commissioner Paula Kirkeby and current City Council candidate at Zirker opening, Thursday in Palo Alto (Peter Kirkeby)

Palo Alto former art commissioner Paula Kirkeby and current City Council candidate at Zirker opening, Thursday in Palo Alto (Peter Kirkeby)


DainaDarcie
Winning

Winning


rhyena halpern

additional reporting by Jodi Wilgoren Rudoren in Jerusalem and New York and throughout the internet

and winnie’s twitter feed: winning

and whiting

Posted in art, ethniceities, media, Plato's Republic, sex, this blue marble | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

A note on the two Williams I am have linked

Posted on August 15, 2014 by markweiss86

First, I paid a condolence call to Mr. William Davis Parker, my old little league coach and father of my schoolmates Nancy Taylor and Bill Parker; Mrs. Joan Parker, who I recalled as having the world’s finest spinach salad recipe, had past away last fall. During our visit, among the recollections I had was that at the first week or so of school in the fifth grade, when I was new to Fremont Hills Elementary, in Los Altos Hills, Calif., (but of course part of PAUSD), there were some intramural touch football games the first of which ended with me catching a pass from Billy Parker in stride and for a long touchdown. At the start of the second game, the captain of that team, the 6th grader Frank Kull, walked up to me, poked me in the chest, and said “I know you. You are Mr. Bomb. Well, I’m gonna cover you myself.” The name did not last more than that one afternoon, but it was nice to be recognized.(March, 2012 — I found out yesterday, calling on another old friend from that neighborhood, around the corner from the fields, Purissima to La Barranca, that Mr. Parker had joined his wife in heaven. He also said, as a type of encouragement to his son, one of the stars, warming up with me, a year younger, a newby: “come on, you hot dog!” Thanks.

I believe the Parkers actually have four kids, not two, including Suzie — older and a younger daughter. I would guess five to ten grandkids. I think Nancy is Nancy Taylor now. (The first of my peers I had ever seen in a bikini: wow. And we were 10).

Posted in Plato's Republic, sports | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Will Sigua Monument in Los Altos Hills

Posted on August 15, 2014 by markweiss86
Will Sigua Monument in center-right field, at Stan Troedson Field, Los Altos Hills Little League grounds, 235 feet from home plate. I played for the Dodgers there, 1974 and 1975. Ironically, a few minutes after shooting this, I learned of the death of William Parker, my coach.

Will Sigua Monument in center-right field, at Stan Troedson Field, Los Altos Hills Little League grounds, 235 feet from home plate. I played for the Dodgers there, 1974 and 1975. Ironically, a few minutes after shooting this, I learned of the death of William Parker, my coach.

Posted in Plato's Republic, this blue marble | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

National cream sickle day and my corn beef hash

Posted on August 15, 2014 by markweiss86

athenenum

1. Yesterday was National Creamsickle day*, although I missed the opportunity to drag my Oldenburg to the Oak Creek clubhouse to contextualize the event — a couple other opportunities popped up and one can only be so many places at a time — real life took on the fast cheap and out of control texture of Plastic Alto.

2. There is a breakfast klatch that is based in Barron Park that I am an adjunct member of — for instance, I sometimes join them at Joanie’s on Cali Ave for corned beef hash and eggs — and one of the members sent me a link, weeks ago, about a podcast he heard, which is about new urbanism.

3. Sussing out the import of that group of memes led me to an article about San Francisco planning in 1904 and the suggestion by Dan Burnham to build a giant Athens (the Goddess, also known as an Athenaum?) on Twin Peaks.

4. I once suggested we build a giant John Arrillaga monument here, as a way to sort out his ego from what is practical regarding 27 University.

5. I did see the Will Sigua monument in Los Altos Hills yesterdaywillSiguaMonument, an event which further catalyzed the enhanced texture of my day.

Proposed white male with leisure trapping monument for Palo Alto, with one leg at Hoover Pavillion and other leg at El Camino Park

Proposed white male with leisure trapping monument for Palo Alto, with one leg at Hoover Pavillion and other leg at El Camino Park

Notes:

1. wiki graph on New Urbanism

New Urbanism has drawn both praise and criticism from all parts of the political spectrum. In an interview in Reason, a right-libertarian magazine, professor Peter Gordon, a professor of Urban Planning from University of Southern California, spoke out in favor of suburbanization and criticized New Urbanism as ignoring consumer preference and the free market claiming that cities have moved towards car-oriented development because that is what people want.[29]

On the other hand, journalist Alex Marshall has decried New Urbanism as essentially a marketing scheme that repackages conventional suburban sprawl behind a façade of nostalgic imagery and empty, aspirational slogans.[30] In a 1996 article in Metropolis Magazine, Marshall denounced New Urbanism as “a grand fraud”.[31] The attack continued in numerous articles, including an opinion column in the Washington Post in September of the same year,[32] and in Marshall’s first book, How Cities Work: Suburbs, Sprawl, and the Roads Not Taken[33]

Critics have asserted that the effectiveness claimed for the New Urbanist solution of mixed income developments lacks statistical evidence.[34] Independent studies have supported the idea of addressing poverty through mixed-income developments,[35][36] but the argument that New Urbanism produces such diversity has been challenged from findings from one community in Canada.[37]

2. podcast link about Minneapolis new urbanism klatch

Strong Towns

3. blogger in Sf with short film about Google bus

4. about Claes Oldenburg’s Good Humor Bar

See also: good humor versus cream sickle

See also: good humor versus cream sickle

5. maybe I should see if there is a yelp photo of corned beef hash at Joanies, or A Good Morning or Cibos. (I do have that Greg Brown Cibos, from just yesterday, or Wedneday)

6. bottom line: food for thought but maybe greenwash of growth for growth’s sake

*according to this article, the invention of the cream sickle and Burnham’s plans for a monument on Twin Peaks occurred in that same year, 1905

Posted in art, media, Plato's Republic | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Weiss to appear at Elks Club Palo Alto September 22 at 1:11 p.m.

Posted on August 15, 2014 by markweiss86

Palo Alto City Council candidate Mark Weiss, the minimalist who mixes Ralph Nader with Donald Judd*, will appear at the Elks Club on Monday, September 22, 2014 for exactly one minute, at 1:11 p.m.

Twelve candidates will appear at a forum sponsored by Rotary Club, which overall will last 90 ridiculously long and boring minutes, or an hour and a half.

Weiss plans to bike from his North Palo Alto abode — a one-bedroom apartment at Oak Creek — to the south Palo Alto venue, as he did for a “scoping meeting” (?, #@&^) recently. He is considering learning to unicycle in keeping with the digital them of the event, zeroes and one.

Weiss announced today that he is also seeking the endorsement of musician Mac MacCaughan, whose 1995 song “The 1st Part” oddly enough contains, when you play a 180-gram vinyl version backwards on a Crosley turntable bought from Urban Outfitters, the entirety of his 150-word platform, albeit in pig-Latin. (Ok, pig-latin with a southern or north florida drawl, as distinct from a Clyde Jones on the roof of Crooks Corner number).

Did we mention that Superchunk played Weiss’ Earthwise Productions five-year show, in 1999? Weiss said that in payback for Mac rocking the Cubby the Cub Bear t-shirt the next night at GAMH, Weiss will wear the blue shirt and flannel depicted above, although to fit it, Weiss will have to lose 20 pounds, mostly by increasing his lap swim at Oak Creek’s 25-m pool. (Isn’t there a Superchunk song about 25-m lap swim pools? No, that’s driveway-to-driveway-to-driveway-to-driveway-dunk)

superchunkmbw

The precision of Judd’s sculpture has led people to see an idealizing impulse behind it. But Judd saw himself as empiricist and his work as sharpening the perceptions of a public addled by encountering falseness daily on every front, from advertising to architecture. (that’ actually Kenneth Baker, on Judd)

edit to add: at the Rotary Club candidates forum, coming up Sept. 22, they want us to have 40 copies of a 150-word platform. Wonder if I can get Merge to donate in kind lyrics to “The First Part” as a way around spending the $6 or so on xeroxing — in 2009 and 2012 I amassed 7,000 votes combined without spending a dime.

So this is the first part
We’re drunk and the selfless relentless caresses
How long must the first part last
Before we make our respective messes?

Well all the clocks wound down
Well all the clocks wound down
And all the doors thrown open
One good minute could last me a whole year

One good minute will last me a whole year
Well it’s a delicate line
We draw it in pink
We draw it in white

So take your time with it
Yeah take your time
I have remembered these things before
Whispered phrases and emotions

I have remembered these things before
Whispered phrases and emotions
And I know that they will only
I know that they will only haunt me

One good minute could last me a whole year
One good minute will last me a whole year
Well it’s a delicate line
We draw it in pink

We draw it in white
So take your time with it
Yeah take your time

I guess I’m Ralph Nader meets Donald Judd meets Chance the Gardener meets Wesley Willis or something, if I claim this is my platform. Actually, the clock metaphor fits with George Packer “The Unwinding”

Posted in art, chapel hill, math, media, Plato's Republic, sex, this blue marble, words | Tagged | Leave a comment

Joe Zirker show at Art Center

Posted on August 15, 2014 by markweiss86

Joe Zirker actually asked me to shoot his show, both the art and the people, and I complied with about 34 shots before it got dark enough that my camera starts to automatically use a flash, and I stopped. That plus I had promised myself I would leave at 7 to catch Charlie Chan at the Olympics.

Joe and Eva’s grand-daughter Carmisa (I hope I am spelling that) started telling me her work and study in social justice. I wanted to counter with a description of the so-called Gunn graffiti hate crime. I’d like her take on what the heck that was all about here — I am resting my case that the First Amendment carries despite efforts by the school, the press and the spokesperson for PAPD to fan the flames of racism and classism here.

Ok, Joe, you deserve better than someone to hijack your event for political agendas, even ones you or your family might agree with. In fact Joe Zirker in honor of his show, and his 90th birthday, deserves 90 actual art critics to see and write on this set. I will try, therefore, to send this post to 90 art writers and bloggers. Maybe Joe Oliveira can forward this to Peter Selz, who we saw (and I shot) recently at Cantor and WCC.

Carmisa wondered if the couple depicted in this Joe Zirker piece were his parents (her great-great-grand-parents)

Carmisa wondered if the couple depicted in this Joe Zirker piece were his parents (her great-great-grand-parents)

Posted in art, ethniceities, Plato's Republic, sex, sf moma, this blue marble | Tagged | Leave a comment

It’s appalling and frankly it weakens our discourse and the diversity of perspectives

Posted on August 14, 2014 by markweiss86

or, Two Sides of Sid

It’s appalling and frankly it weakens our discourse and the diversity of perspectives.

sid espinosa on lack of women and asian and overall candidates or mark weiss on Measure D Amendment backed by Roger Smith, Betsy Bechtel, Liz Kniss, Walter Hays, Peter Drekmeir and Sid Espinosa.

source: Palo Alto Weekly op-ed “If you are not running for Palo Alto City Council, why not?” June 9, 2009 by Sid

Sid, don't turn your back on the inclusive basis of Democracy

Sid, don’t turn your back on the inclusive basis of Democracy

edit to add: somehow forgot Mike Cobb and Judy Kleinberg. Don’t get me wrong, I like Sid, and feel there is some amount of mutual respect. I just don’t get him here. His June, 2009 column is one of the things that drew me into this process, now five years in. (And for the record, I got 800 votes that year, 5,700 in 2012 so that projects geometrically to about 35,000 projected votes by November 4).

Mike Cobb I met initially when, from fall, 1994 to January, 2001 I was producing two concerts a month at Cubberley; he practically was Cubberley in those days; they almost changed the name to Cobberley. (Actually, Del Thorpe was the facility manager, reporting to Barry Weiss, Richard James, Paul Thiltgen). Recently, apropos of the current discussions of The Cub, I said, running into Mr. Cobb at Midtown Coffee shop, that I would be willing to do research for a white paper on arts at Cubberley, if that would help him, but we never followed up or Cobb-sumated the deal. He did give me some advice: go along to get along. I’m trying.

Judy Kleinberg I met around that same time, 1995, 1996 in that she was running Safer Summer which produced teen band concerts at Just Desserts on Bryant and we traded notes on teen talent. When my relationship with Del Thorpe went completely sour, I wrote Judy about intervening on my behalf, but September, 2001 as we recall brought a bigger problems, or so I thought, and I just dropped the notion and became an artist manager (a B2B model, so to speak) before or beyond concerts per se.

Someone advised me recently that Measure D (this is our third Measure D — the first, my mnemonic is “demeaning” was about pensions and the public safety cba, the second about Maybell) because it is so gradual is kind of a red herring and probably trivial, but even so. (I wrote a proposed ballot argument against the amendment but was apparently outflanked by the higher-ranking group, if City Clerk persists in letting them call themselves something other than a campaign committee dressed in drag, talk about clear story).

Sid gave me a pep talk in the aftermath of 2009 fall, when I applied to Library Commission in early 2010; he even through me a softball question at the interview — what did I think of the recent commission white paper? — but I somehow whiffed on that. I’ve written on him at least three times here, and mentioned him 20 times, in first 830 posts. (I tried to get him to co-sponsor a visit by his Wesleyan colleague the basketball trickster Bobbito Garcia). I’d love to have Sid over (to Terry’s actually, I have no tv) and watch either “Sweet Smell of Success” or “All the Kings Men”. Or sit with him at a Stanford Theatre co-bill of such — after I become mayor if not before. This is a funny way to issue the invitation.

Posted in Plato's Republic | Tagged | Leave a comment

Maverick intentions

Posted on August 14, 2014 by markweiss86
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a comment