Being a city kid, I don’t have much of a feel for farms, so I did a search on aerial photos of farms and faked up the phony-baloney farm above. Sorry to report that my enthusiasm for Inktober has waned and I’m glad that this one gets it over with for now.
This is my two thousandth published Blog Post, Friends, and I want to make it count. So I am using it for advocacy. I wish to urge Arizona voters not to vote for gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake. Ms. Lake took the Republican primary via her glib and charismatic stage presence, her endorsement from Donald Trump, and her remarkable ability to turn into a barracuda every time a journalist asked her a question she didn’t like. And now she is attackiing and lying her way to the Governor’s office, and if Arizonans fall for her attractive lies, she may well win.
But don’t take my word for it. As a subscriber to azcentral dot com, the online component of the media entity that also publishes the Arizona Republic, I get newspaper headlines like these on my feed. If I call Lake a glib liar, I’m not being the Lone Ranger here.
In the primary Lake put up a kajillion posters of herself side by side with Donald Trump, proudly proclaiming “TRUMP ENDORSED.” Now that she’s won the primary, and Trump is in all kinds of legal trouble, her photoless posters say “POLICE ENDORSED.” Her many years as a newscaster have empowered her to turn on a dime as far as emphasis goes. She can pull viewers one way with an earthquake megadeath or serial-killer story and one minute later switch to the “lighter side” with something that makes people laugh and sigh happily. And this is what makes her dangerous, Friends. If only she were a Force For Good, that would be a valuable superpower. But she is a force for the same evil that got us a million dead in the ongoing pandemic. Because though she dropped Trump from her posters, she is still 100% in favor of his policies. And her style of attacking journalists and telling pants-on-fire lies is identical to his.
So please: do not vote for Kari Lake.
Kari Lake
Kidnap Truth and send to HelL
Anthony Fauci–HE’s to blame. A
Rigged Vote played like Lawrence WelK
Invests a gal who plays Trump’s gamE
I have drawn Ms. Lake saying “ARREST Dr. Fauci!” She has said that. “SEE 2000 Mules!” She has urged people to view this election-fraud propaganda product of Trump catspaw Dinesh D’Souza, a film that even William Barr dismisses as “bullshit.” “Vote for ME!” may not be a direct quote, but every candidate says that simply by running for office. But I take a bit of satiric/symbolic liberty with her last word balloon, which says “PUT Arizona in the hand that held Trump.” Infer from that what you will.
In the mid-1980s I went camping three times in Havasupai, the west end of the Grand Canyon, with family and friends. This drawing looks nothing like Havasupai but I threw the helicopter in because if you took that 10-mile trek to the Havasupai campsite, by mule or on foot, and then found yourself unable or unwilling to go out the way you came in, there was a helicopter ferry service. Cost per person, in 1985 US Dollars: $500.
As a young child I read voraciously from the fairy-tale books on our bookshelves. There were some from Andrew Lang’s series, some Howard Pyle, an Edmund Dulac, and something called something like Seven Stories of Seven Wishes. But the best fairy-story I ever read came later, from J.R.R. Tolkien: “Smith of Wootton Major.” In it Smith, called Starbrow because of a glowing trinket affixed to his forehead, explores the land of Faery and unknowingly meets, and dances with, its Queen. Tolkien’s Queen of Faery reminds me of a friend of mine.
In his book The Natural Way To Draw, outstanding art teacher Kimon Nicolaïdes offers this advice: “Draw anything.” Those two words helped me get through this difficult prompt. I did not want to disgust anyone, so I departed a bit from clinical realism and drew the WORD booger and make it just boogerlike enough to get the concept-point across. I’ve been fighting the urge to blow my nose since I started this thing.
To convey the concept of Heist, I reached into my Baby Boomer childhood and plucked out a cliché cartoon robber holding up a big bag of money. He has the requisite stubble, stocking cap, and mask. Now I’m curious as to how many Robbers actually dressed the part this way. My guess is, pretty close to zero.
Crime/Heist/Theft: Call 911 on high alert/Request enforcement; there’s a dearth/It’s downright baffling how we swerve/Meandering from Surf to Turf/Emergencies don’t wait–they hurt
Arm Mad Dill Lo
A hide of Armor Plating does so well•Archenemies steam-thwarted by a shell
Roll-up-in-ball achieves this modest goal•Regrouping and then frisking to and fro
Meandering through days–no squall–nor moo•Make good & goods: no-frilly things to do
Today’s prompt, “Kind,” brought to mind one of my favorite scenes from Kurt Vonnegut’s magic/real God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater. Eliot Rosewater, head of the Rosewater Foundation and active alcoholic, is so revered by the denizens of Rosewater, Indiana that a new mom has asked him to baptize her newborn twins. So Eliot is imagining what he will say to them, and he comes up with this: “Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you’ve got a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies–God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”
“Trip” is slippery. It can mean Stumble or Journey or Psychedelic Experience or Activate. Trips is pokerspeak for three of a kind. A Tripmeter is an odometer within an odometer. Trip can even describe a human being. “That guy is a real trip. Flaky as a Betty Crocker crust.”
For Halloween, a romantic ghost and a willing youngster conspire to make a Bad Pun.
One with Clay, Image and Text 