...but I'da had to've missed the dance.

2010 Accomplishment
Aside from maintaining my sanity, and working
consistently as a freelancer in NYC, I'm gonna
go with learning to trust people less.

2010 Discovery
I have an incredible amount of resilience.


Favorite 2010 Vacation/Holiday
Spending Thanksgiving in New Mexico with my family.
Mended old fences and got some answers about
who I am becoming and how to keep on track.

Best dining in 2010
My kitchen in New Orleans.

2010 Regret
Nothing I can think of. Lots of bad decisions, but
none that I can say I regret. Perhaps if I repeat them.

Magic Moment in 2010
Getting my Masters in May.

What states did you visit in 2010?
Louisiana, New York, Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, Connecticut,
Kentucky, Tennessee, Pennsylvania, Alabama, Mississippi, West Virginia.

The 2010 Surprise
My baby sister, the Air Force Sargent, having a baby.


Three 2011 Goals
Converse more.
Expect less.
Keep passing the open windows.


(Meme by recommendation of Spo)

So, here's what I missed.

A beautiful little film documenting the 26 December
blizzard in my neighborhood in Astoria, New York.
Glad I missed it, but now I have to go back to it
and face the muck laden glaciers on every street corner.

Watch, and try to keep your heart from warming.

Joyeux Noël tout le monde!!

'Twas the nocturnal segment of the diurnal period preceding the annual Yuletide celebration, and throughout our place of residence,
kinetic activity was not in evidence among the possessors of this
potential, including that species of domestic rodent known as Mus
musculus. Hosiery was meticulously suspended from the forward edge of the
wood burning caloric apparatus, pursuant to our anticipatory pleasure
regarding an imminent visitation from an eccentric philanthropist among
whose folkloric appellations is the honorific title of St. Nicholas.

The prepubescent siblings, comfortably ensconced in their respective
accommodations of repose, were experiencing subconscious visual
hallucinations of variegated fruit confections moving rhythmically through
their cerebrums. My conjugal partner and I, attired in our nocturnal head
coverings, were about to take slumberous advantage of the hibernal darkness
when upon the avenaceous exterior portion of the grounds there ascended
such a cacophony of dissonance that I felt compelled to arise with alacrity
from my place of repose for the purpose of ascertaining the precise source
thereof.

Hastening to the casement, I forthwith opened the barriers sealing
this fenestration, noting thereupon that the lunar brilliance
without, reflected as it was on the surface of a recent crystalline
precipitation, might be said to rival that of the solar meridian
itself - thus permitting my incredulous optical sensory organs to
behold a miniature airborne runnered conveyance drawn by eight
diminutive specimens of the genus Rangifer, piloted by a minuscule,
aged chauffeur so ebullient and nimble that it became instantly
apparent to me that he was indeed our anticipated caller.

With his ungulate motive power travelling at what may possibly have been more
vertiginous velocity than patriotic alar predators, he vociferated
loudly, expelled breath musically through contracted labia, and
addressed each of the octet by his or her respective cognomen - "Now
Dasher, now Dancer..." et al. - guiding them to the uppermost exterior
level of our abode, through which structure I could readily distinguish the
concatenations of each of the 32 cloven pedal extremities.
As I retracted my cranium from its erstwhile location, and was performing a
180-degree pivot, our distinguished visitant achieved - with utmost
celerity and via a downward leap - entry by way of the smoke passage. He
was clad entirely in animal pelts soiled by the ebony residue from
oxidations of carboniferous fuels which had accumulated on the walls
thereof. His resemblance to a street vendor I attributed largely to the
plethora of assorted playthings which he bore dorsally in a commodious
cloth receptacle.

His orbs were scintillant with reflected luminosity, while his submaxillary
dermal indentations gave every evidence of engaging amiability. The
capillaries of his malar regions and nasal appurtenance were engorged with
blood which suffused the subcutaneous layers, the former approximating the
coloration of Albion's floral emblem, the latter that of the Prunus avium,
or sweet cherry. His amusing sub- and supralabials resembled nothing so
much as a common loop knot, and their ambient hirsute facial adornment
appeared like small, tabular and columnar crystals of frozen water.

Clenched firmly between his incisors was a smoking piece whose grey
fumes, forming a tenuous ellipse about his occiput, were suggestive
of a decorative seasonal circlet of holly. His visage was wider than it was
high, and when he waxed audibly mirthful, his corpulent abdominal region
undulated in the manner of impectinated fruit syrup in a hemispherical
container. He was, in short, neither more nor less than an obese, jocund,
multigenarian gnome, the optical perception of whom rendered me visibly
frolicsome despite every effort to refrain from so being. By rapidly
lowering and then elevating one eyelid and rotating his head slightly to
one side, he indicated that trepidation on my part was groundless.

Without utterance and with dispatch, he commenced filling the
aforementioned appended hosiery with various of the aforementioned
articles of merchandise extracted from his aforementioned previously
dorsally transported cloth receptacle. Upon completion of this task,
he executed an abrupt about-face, placed a single manual digit in
lateral juxtaposition to his olfactory organ, inclined his cranium
forward in a gesture of leave-taking, and forthwith effected his
egress by renegotiating (in reverse) the smoke passage. He then
propelled himself in a short vector onto his conveyance, directed a
musical expulsion of air through his contracted oral sphincter to the
antlered quadrupeds of burden, and proceeded to soar aloft in a
movement hitherto observable chiefly among the seed-bearing portions
of a common weed. But I overheard his parting exclamation, audible
immediately prior to his vehiculation beyond the limits of
visibility: "Ecstatic Yuletide to the planetary constituency, and to
that self same assemblage, my sincerest wishes for a salubriously
beneficial and gratifyingly pleasurable period between sunset and
dawn."

Featured Artist: Nina Simone

Nina Simone, Ne Me Quitte Pas from James Davis on Vimeo.

The Holstee Manifesto, a typographically sound meditation

as found by Uncle Beefy

Ce matin la...

Inspiration struck.
Partially out of not finding a wrapping paper I liked.
But the result is quite nice if I do say so myself.






Elsewhere in the apartment:

Monsieur L'Orange sleeps in.


Breakfast in bed of bacon & blu cheese gratin, cucumbers and tea.

]

Now Reading...

Films: Pirate Radio, Richard Curtis (2009)

Featured Artist: Nick Knight featuring Bjork & Alexander McQueen

Tribute to Alexander McQueen by Nick Knight, music by Björk from SHOWstudio on Vimeo.

Cautiously Excited

Dissociative Mixing.
Things that ought not, actually do.
Suspend disbelief?
yes. I think so.




Images by Laurence Ellis,
Stolen from cuatro por uno

From Enchantment to Easy

Sunset in Albuquerque with doves on telephone wires.


Tour of latest additions of best friends father's Motorbike collection.





The incredible tree decorating duo of Abigail and Hannah

The Tree at the Compound.


Long lost art from undergrad







Tiny Planes and Big Hats at Denver International.

Where I've been...

In the freezing tranquility of North Western New Mexico.
Visiting family on the farm, being allergic to the sheep,
making a quilt for my freezing NYC apartment out of fabric
I forgot I had here. Eating a ton of green chile (not chilie,
mind you. this is New Mexico) and a bit of the red as well.
Meeting up with all of my super healthy New Mexican friends.
It's been decided that Albuquerque is where I'd be healthiest
with all the organic local eating and super easy access to
outdoor recreation and low gym rates. New Orleans feeds my soul
and New York feeds my bank account (sometimes.)

A good friend of mine were talking the other day about what informs
our ideas of romantic love in terms of movies we saw between the
ages of 7 -10 years old. His was Stand By Me, which I have to say
is pretty darn endearing. For a while I could only remember watching
David Lynch's Blue Velvet before I remembered all the old Hollywood
movies like Roman Holiday and The Seven Year Itch as well as Disney's
Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty. Talk about a close call, never mind a
close call that explains a few things. Although Sleeping Beauty explains
why I constantly wait demurely to be approached by potential prince charmings.

Anyway, the pictures....

Near the family farm in Coolidge, New Mexico.




the sheep I've been allergic to since I can Remember.

The Bosque de Albuquerque along the Rio Grande.


Finally cured the craving for a Green Chile Cheeseburger.
A few times over.




Quilting like a bee.





Now awaiting Santa. Probably in NYC. Hopefully with a few other friends
who can't make it home for Christmas.

crush