Archive for July, 2021

The Olympics Opening Ceremonies Live.

Monday, July 26th, 2021

They’re still calling it Tokyo 2020. I guess they had everything designed and didn’t want to change it.

The 5,000 medals are made completely from e-waste. The Japanese donated all their electronic crap and factories spent hours and hours extracting the precious metals. I think that’s cool.

Hey Steve Kornacki! Kornacki’s Khakis back in effect! You give me those stats I neither needed or wanted, Steve! Glad to hear ’em!

Okay, official opening ceremony has started. There is no audience in the stadium. It gives it a kind of gravitas.

Wait a minute, the Emperor of Japan is wearing a boring West-style suit? Dude, he’s the Emperor. I would wear the fanciest robes and accoutrement I have in my vault. Lord knows one doesn’t get too many opportunities to rock your finest Appointed-by-God attire.

Beautiful opening video.

They have an enormous Mt. Fugi with an orb on top to represent the true name of Japan, Land of the Rising Sun.

The flag also represents Land of the Rising Sun. Which is why I think this design for the Tokyo Olympics is better than the one they chose.

They’re using a lot of light painting on the floor and it is gorgeous. One of my favorite examples of that is this Kylie Minogue video.

Oooo, they got real weird and performance-arty with this. I feel like this MoMA thing is going to go over the head of… most of everyone in the world. Don’t get me wrong, it’s gorgeous but it’s a bit more Twyla Tharp-y then I think this audience can handle.

Didn’t think during the portion on the rich history of Japanese carpentry there would be tap-dancing but okay. It definitely conveys wood is hard.

Oh hell yeah, the lesbian goth hand-voguing girls Ayabambi are there! Bold move!

Okay, they’re making up countries at this point. Comoros? And every island in the Caribbean is its own country? My U.S. public school education is showing.

The people walking the teams in and cheering on the sides represent manga comics. I love how each country’s sign is in the manga screaming talk bubble. When the characters speak normally, it’s plain round speech bubbles.

But when the characters scream, there are lines like rays of light shooting outward.

Due to that, I read every country’s name as a shrieking harpy.

All the countries are in. And now they’re doing some horribly awkward thing in bad wigs with colored boxes to show unity and I’m out. Nighty-night everyone.

 

P.S. Immediately after I turned off the TV there was some awesome stuff with 1800 drones. But there was a epically cringe-y version of “Imagine” that rotted my teeth so I ain’t sad about that.

Here’s the drone portion.

Posted in Random Art Bloggery, The Telly | No Comments »

Museums.

Wednesday, July 21st, 2021

I visited San Francisco before The Pannie and I was delighted to find out there was an exhibition on Burning Man which, while fantastic, was problematic because now I am so hungry to go back. If one remembers I went in 2012 and while the dust and sun made me wanna DIIIIIEE the art was so unbelievable I would forget the horrors of nature for hours at a time. And the exhibit reminded me of that.

The left had an art car of a dragon made entirely from kitchen supplies, a bus that had been transformed into a movie theater that showed old black-and-white movies and origami-style mushrooms that cycled through the rainbow and extended / contracted when you pressed a button. Oh my God, guys.

There was also an enormous Arc du Triomphe-style collapsable arc. You can appreciate the color-changing mushrooms in the background.

There also had some outfits on display which was fine, not as exciting as the large pieces but still, stunning workmanship.

I was there with Nessa and we ended up walking through the rest of the museum and I saw my dream piece. I’ve made it abundantly clear my feelings on ocellated turkeys (I’m pro in a big way) so off in the distance I thought I saw something truly magical. And I was right.

It was made of clay and I wanted in my possession immediately. It’s good it was in a glass case because I would have tucked it under my shirt and bolted with it.

I recently went to the Cloisters, a museum in New York specializing in the Middle and Dark Ages of Europe. It was painfully obvious that no one had ever seen a lion, heard of a lion except in the bible and didn’t even know lions were felines. It was rough.

Not a decent one in the bunch. You clearly had skills, look at that golden rooster. Totally looks like a rooster. Europe had wolves, why didn’t you carve wolves? Your lions are so bad.

To redeem their art skills there was a drawing on a dandelion in a very small book. The detail work was exquisite.

If you’re in the San Francisco area, go to the Oakland Museum of California. The Burning Man exhibit is long gone but they have great exhibits all the time. And if you’re in the New York area, go to the Cloisters. The gardens are wonderful and the permanent collection is excellent.

Posted in Burning Man, Random Art Bloggery | No Comments »

PTAC Improvement Part Finished.

Wednesday, July 14th, 2021

Okay! I did it! It is extremely good considering I had no idea what I was doing.

I spray-painted the PTAC casing with spray paint meant for plastic but it never looked crispy-white, there was still a whole lotta beige. So I sponged Ye Olde White Rust-oleum Enamel Paint all over which made it a bit shiny but that’s okay, at least now it’s white. I have a major bone to pick with the design department at GE. I wanted to buy white silicone. White. Here’s what the white silicone looks like:

And here is what the clear silicone looks like:

The only difference is a teeny-tiny word in the corner. That’s it.

Yeah. Which is how I ended up with several tubes of clear. It’s fine, I used it for the base layer to lock in the foam and then used the white for the final visible layer. That way I’m sure there’s no air leaks all around.

Fun fact: I don’t think you’re supposed to put the silicone on after you’ve put the plastic faceplate on because now I have rendered it impossible to open but ehhh, it looks smooth and if anyone needs access I can slice the silicone neatly along the edge and patch it when it goes back. I have no regrets.

Is it glorious? No. But it doesn’t punch you in the face with its ugliness as you enter the room. Your brain doesn’t even acknowledge its existence which is really what I was going for. Quick reminder of the before:

VERY noticeable. VERY hooogly. Now, vastly improved. I’m quite pleased with myself. Pat on the back to me.

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