Is art dangerous? That's what some governments would say. A friend and I spent 40 minutes in this one exhibit room trying to absorb all that was going on in this exhibit, titled "Bare Life." I need to read the program and return. Such powerful images by Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei. Thank you, Washington University for making this a free admission at the Kemper Art Museum.
From what I understand about Trump's decision to attack Iran's General Qasem Soleimani in Iraq, it seems to be a dangerous move, an unforced error that puts the U.S. at risk. There is a lot of outrage on the political left. Before attacking Trump, I think it's important to recognize that the U.S. is a bipartisan war-mongering state, and this includes numerous undeclared wars waged by Barack Obama. It also includes the fact that there are few vocal anti-war Democrats running for President. It also includes widespread Congressional nonchalance in the face of the recent report showing "U.S. officials constantly said they were making progress. They were not, and they knew it, an exclusive Post investigation found."
It's also important to recognize that Congress has the power to supervise and control these adventures, but won't. War is job-security for many politicians. It makes them look strong and thus more electable. Thus the waging of wars of discretion continues to be our non-stop horrifically expensive and dangerous hobby. War-mongering is a cancer in our bipartisan body politic. I'd urge everyone who is criticizing Trump to keep this in perspective. The problem runs much deeper than Trump, and the reason you won't see widespread protests in the street in reaction to Trump's terrible decision is the same reason you didn't see such protests while Obama was waging numerous undeclared wars, many of them with no clearly defined metric of success.
This is a Public Service Announcement!
Three days ago, I was working on my cars in my garage. I reached down to toss some leaves out into the alley and got bit on the wrist by something, presumably a spider. The bite flared painfully up over the next 48 hours. Today has finally crusted
over and the surrounding redness is finally receding, though it is still painful. I used ice and anti-biotic ointment.
Here is my advice: 1) If leaves are lying around in your garage, use a rake or gloves if you're going to touch them. 2) If you get bit, if it's painful, if redness starts expanding around the bite, and if you look up "brown recluse" on the Internet, you'll have an "oh, shit" moment. They are common in Missouri (where I live) and many other states to the south and east of Missouri. Most people will be OK in a few days, but it can be a big deal for which there is no anti-venom and it can inflict a small minority of people with serious long term medical complications 3) many articles tell you to bring the spider to the doctor so they can ID it. This leads to comical images of going out and looking for a spider you never actually saw. You'll imagine looking at their little spider-faces and trying to decide which one looks guilty (even though it was just minding its own business when you trashed his/her home. Which brings me back to Rule #1: Next time I touch a pile of leaves in my garage, I'm going to use a rake or wear gloves. I've never got bit before but I should have thought about it, because a good friend of mine (you know who you are!) had some serious medical treatment for a brown recluse bite several years ago while cleaning out her garage.
I have an acquaintance who works in pest control. He told me that every house in St. Louis has brown recluse spiders in the house. They go about their business and you might not see them. If you'd like to have fewer of them in the house, you can spray pesticide, but I don't like the idea of spreading those chemicals around given that my two teen-aged daughters live here. Instead, a few years ago, I bought a pack of sticky pads that people sometimes use to catch mice. They catch bugs too. If you leave them out for a few months and then inspect them, you will be AMAZED at how many spiders and other bugs end up glued to your trap.
Or rule number 4: Don't ever clean out your garage.
It's fun to watch common creek rocks (that I found around Farmington Missouri) tumble into these shapes and colors. These rocks are about 1-2" and they have been tumbled through 3 levels of grit over three weeks. They are now tumbling in polish grit for another week, where they will pick up a clearness and a shine. For this batch I gathered reds and patterns and these types of rocks are easily found in creeks around Farmington and Fredericktown, Missouri. These rocks didn't look much like this until tumbled, however. After I posted an earlier post on tumbled rocks, two friends caught the passion and bought rock tumblers of their own. For anyone else interested, I'm using a Thumler brand rock tumbler, Model B.
I've lived in St. Louis all my life, not realizing (until recently) the amazing vistas located within a two-hour drive from my home. I took these two photos today (on an iPhone 11, processed with Aurora HDR). Both of these scenes were taken in the Mark Twain National Forest, somewhat south of Fredericktown, Missouri. Top photo is of the St. Francis River.
This third photo shows a friend's Irish Wolfhound, "Owen," enjoying the sunset over the St. Francis River in the Mark Twain National Forest.
