TRAYB

five reasons why i haven't posted

2008-06-16T14:29:00.002-04:00

1. The BF and I were busy getting married.
The big event happened here in the state of Georgia, so the "m "word is technically a misnomer, but so what? Sure feels like a marriage to me.

2. I've been busy writing a book.
Two books, actually. I'm still chipping away at my memoir, which is turning out to be a Sisyphean task, but I'm also working on a travel guide to Atlanta. Unlike the memoir, I have a contract for the travel book — with actual money involved. Who knew?

3. I've been busy traveling.
Puerto Vallarta, Pensacola and next up, a trip to Italy. Mama mia!

4. I've been busy drawing.
Check out my Flickr gallery for some fun new doodles. One of my recent faves appears above, an illustration that appears in AirTran's Go magazine this month.

5. I've been busy campaigning for Barack Obama.
OK, so that's a lie. But I did just purchase a Barack Support Pack from the Obama Store, so let the campaigning begin. Yes We Can!

more than meets the eye?

2008-04-22T23:00:00.002-04:00

So the BF and I finally got around to watching Transformers this weekend. You'll have to bear with me, because I realize that:

1. I'm about nine months late for any sort of critical discussion of the film, and

2. Transformers is, at its soulless, CGI heart, an inane action flick that doesn't deserve any sort of critical discussion.

That said, I liked the movie more than I thought I would, but not for any of the obvious reasons. The effects were definitely eye-popping; I'm bummed I didn't get to experience them in a theater.
I agree with the consensus that the human story lines were stupid and they overshadowed the robots.
There were holes in the plot you could drive a semi through. In fact, the semi drove through those holes, transformed into a giant robot, did a quick 180 and body-slammed a Decepticon disguised as a dump truck. That four-second sequence alone cost $30 million to make, but the movie grossed $700 million worldwide, so who am I to argue?

Anyway. I found the movie fascinating because I saw it as one long (and often clunky) metaphor for America's failed energy policy — specifically, our dependence on foreign oil.
Again, bear with me. Spoilers ahead, as if you care.

The opening scene plants us in the Middle East, with Qatar functioning as a stand-in for Iraq. Here we see a fuck-load of U.S. military personnel caught off guard and slaughtered by a Decepticon that looks like a friendly jet. "What's the U.S. doing in Qatar?" you might ask. Good question. Protecting the oil! Why else is America ever in the Middle East?

Americans are oblivious to the bloodshed that happens over oil fields half a world away, as we see in the next few scenes with hottie Shia LaBeouf singularly focused on buying a car and banging chicks. He's a typical, self-involved suburbanite who's willing to auction off his family history for the sake of owning a vehicle, which says plenty. But our love affair with the automobile turns out to have consequences. After Shia acquires the dream car, he discovers that maybe the car owns him. He loses control of his life once a Camaro comes into the picture, which is almost always the case.

Enter the Autobots, who explain how their home planet of Cybertron was ripped apart in a war over the All Spark. Hello, spark—as in oil! The All-Spark now resides on Earth hidden in the Cube (yeah, who writes this shit?), which, as it turns out, the U.S. government has hidden in Hoover Dam.

The rest of the film follows the Decepticons and Autobots duking it out over the Cube while the U.S. military tries feebly to help. I saw this as a commentary on the global battle for fossil fuels and the way America gets entangled in foreign wars because of our oil dependency.
Notably, the climatic final battle happens in L.A., surely a poster child for car culture gone way wrong and the gross excesses of America writ large. The urban battlefield itself felt like a nod to the Iraq War, with innocent civilians caught up in the carnage and enemy fighters that could easily be confused with friends.

In the end, the All Spark gets used up (like our fossil fuels!) and the Autobots are left on Earth. Shia gets the girl and the car. Sadly, I'm not so sure that real life is going to have such a happy ending.

Happy Earth Day!

war, part two

2008-04-03T17:14:00.003-04:00

Here's my anti-war illustration I mentioned yesterday.

The story this week involved a group of women who stormed an Army recruiting station, chanting, "Grandmothers for peace! Stop this war!"

Funny, you'd expect the peace movement to be led by idealistic youth, not outraged seniors.

Here's the item.

war, part one

2008-04-02T08:21:00.003-04:00

My friend Bradford has posted a series of very cool anti-war posters by the design team of Joe and Gerry Simboli. The images are really amazing, and Bradford's helping them sell prints for $75-$150.

The timing feels cosmic for me; my latest Blotter doodle has an anti-war message as well. I'll post that one tomorrow once the Loaf updates its site.

Meanwhile, this is my favorite of the Simboli prints.

shower the people

2008-04-01T09:28:00.002-04:00

Happy birthday to me. Already this a.m. I've been bombarded with e-mails, text messages, Facebook posts and MySpace comments. (Funny how birthdays have evolved in the digital age.) Many thanks to everyone.

On an unrelated note, here's my new illustration for AirTran's Go magazine. This month's tech article deals with ways to keep your I.T. staff from jumping ship.

I'm on a mission to blog more this month. Let's see if I can keep 'em coming.

irish spring

2008-03-24T16:43:00.003-04:00

Happy Easter! Also, happy St. Patrick’s Day. And happy first day of spring. Did I miss any others?

I realized today that I haven’t updated the site in a while. All of a sudden the seasons are changing and I feel like I’m just waking up from a long winter’s nap. (Although, given the bone-chilling temperatures here today, it looks like Lady Winter isn’t ready to hand over the keys just yet.)

Here’s my newest Blotter illustration. The crime report had to do with a woman who passed out in an Irish pub’s bathroom (I’m guessing too much green beer on St. Patty’s Day) and woke up to find her debit card missing. Erin go bragh!

revenge of the clermont lounge

2008-02-13T13:12:00.003-05:00

For this week's Blotter illustration, I wanted a vaguely film-noir feel to match the retro energy of the Clermont Lounge sign — one of my favorite things about Ponce de Leon Avenue. I ended up dropping almost all color from the final drawing and changed all the blacks to deep blues, which I think came out nicely.

Here's the crime report itself.

i guess the giulianis all sold out

2008-02-12T16:29:00.000-05:00

A funny sight from my neighborhood Borders store. They had a stack of "John McCain: Countdown to Victory" wall calendars all marked down to $1.

Seriously, who would want McCain's craggy face staring at you for the next year?

that's thuper!

2008-02-05T08:24:00.000-05:00

Hello, Super Duper Tuesday.
Tonight I'll be live-blogging (as opposed to, um, dead-blogging?) the primary results for The Advocate's Election 2008 site. I'm camping out at Amsterdam Atlanta's viewing party, which is hosted by the Atlanta Stonewall Democrats, Georgia Equality and OutWorks (among others). If you're in the neighborhood, swing by.

his third life is a dime

2008-02-01T09:01:00.000-05:00

Holy cow, it’s February already. Here’s my new drawing for AirTran’s Go magazine. (The technology column doesn’t appear to be on their site this month, so I’m linking to the homepage instead.)

The article has to do with strategies for growing your money online, specifically using Second Life. The idea of a $20 bill having a quarter as a Second Life avatar made me smile. Judging from my own (very brief) dabbling in Second Life, I’m guessing it really should’ve been the other way around.

mlk day

2008-01-30T16:19:00.001-05:00

For this week's Blotter illustration I did something unusual and dipped into the realm of caricature. The crime report dealt with all the shady stuff that went down in the city on MLK Day, so I thought it would poignant to show MLK himself frowning down from heaven.

Although I'm happy with how the drawing turned out, I'm also sorta kicking myself because I think I invested too much time in it. That's the constant challenge with freelancing (and sometimes with personal works as well): knowing when to say when.
After a year of freelancing full-time I've gotten a lot better about being able to judge the scope of a project, and I'm also faster now at turning out work that I'm proud of. But sometimes a drawing will still take forever to complete, and it seems to be completely unpredictable when that will happen.

stripper rip-off

2008-01-23T16:47:00.000-05:00

The new Blotter drawing. The item involved a 33-year-old man who'd accumulated a $475 tab at a strip club then tried to run out without paying. Nice.

I've been playing around with watercolors lately, thus the gradual shift in background texture.

raaw!

2008-01-16T20:27:00.000-05:00

More crazy folks from the weekly crime report. I had fun with this one.

web 2.0

2008-01-11T18:04:00.001-05:00

While brainstorming for the illustration to go with this month's tech column in AirTran's Go magazine, I kept thinking about an artist who had a profound effect on me as a young reader: Sergio Aragones. I used to really love the doodles he did in the margins of Mad magazine — but even better were his sprawling, two-page spreads that usually involved hundreds of little characters and bizarre situations.
I think some of that spirit came through here to illustrate the story about the participatory nature of Web 2.0.

i feel it all: the year in music

2007-12-27T16:27:00.000-05:00

It’s that time again when critics of all shapes and sizes are putting out their year-in-review packages. I tend to agree with the comment New York Times writer Manohla Dargis made recently when she noted that “Top 10 lists are artificial exercises, assertions of critical ego, capricious and necessarily imperfect.”

For the past two years I’ve offered up my own list of notable songs of the year but I also took a lot of liberties with the assignment. I’m going to try and stick to the calendar this time around, with a few small exceptions here and there.

Favorite songs of 2007

1. “I Feel It All” Feist
The Reminder was by far my favorite album of the year. I could’ve easily named “1 2 3 4” or even “Sea Lion Woman” as my No. 1 selection. Her live show was also phenomenal.

2. “Rehab” Amy Winehouse
I realize that both Amy and Feist were included on tons of top 10 lists this year. And yes, I really did love this track when I first heard it — until it got played to goddamn death. But to me, “Rehab” neatly sums up the sorry state of celebrity culture in 2007, a year when Britney and Lindsay couldn’t pass gas without the bloggers covering it. Meanwhile, Amy’s very public meltdown continues. It’s a sad thing to experience.

3. “Homecoming” Kanye West
The entire album rocks. This song chokes me up for some reason.

4. “Greenlight (Freemasons Remix)” Beyoncé
Probably my favorite dance track of the year. Brings back very happy memories not only of our week in Provincetown but also of being silly with my friend Drew on our cruise in October. Beyoncé’s duet with Shakira, “Beautiful Liar,” gets an honorable mention here.

5. “Love Today” Mika
The BF and I are still laughing about his bizarre live show. What a flamer!

6. “Myriad Harbour” New Pornographers
I’ve written about this one before. Gotta love some Neko.

7. “Big Sky” Annie Lennox
I didn’t like the new album initially, but seeing her perform some of the tracks live gave me a greater appreciation for it. This track wasn’t included in the concert but was my favorite on the CD. Makes me think of Medusa.

8. “Like This” Kelly Rowland
I’m shocked this wasn’t a bigger hit.

9. “Grand Canyon” Tracey Thorn
Did anyone actually buy her album? I wasn’t knocked out of my chair, though I did love “Grand Canyon.” It sounded to me like a lost track from EBTG’s Temperamental — which may have been exactly the problem.

10. “So You Say” Siobhán Donaghy
Lucas shared this artist with me back in September, and the album became my guilty pleasure for the early fall. I don’t think it’s technically been released in the States yet.

11. “Just Fine” Mary J. Blige
Is it too soon to include MJB on a best-of-the-year list, given that the CD only came out two weeks ago? I also really love “Work That”; I just wish it didn’t remind me of the iPod ad.

12. “Sky Blue Sky” Wilco
Lots of folks, including NPR’s Bob Boilen, have said they were disappointed with Wilco’s latest. I liked it. This wistful track makes me think of my brief teenage fling with the Dead. I also liked “What Light.”

13. “No One” Alicia Keys
It’s a little too Top 40 for me to say that I love this song, but I couldn’t get enough of it for about a week in November.

14. “Calabria (2007)” Enur featuring Natasja
An addictive little booty-shaker that my friend Zach shared with me. I listen to it at the gym almost every workout. Sadly, featured vocalist Natasja died this summer in Jamaica.

15. “The Story” Brandi Carlile
She’s raw like Janis Joplin, sweet like Dusty Springfield. The power of this one is sneaky.

Honorable Mentions

• “Business Time” Flight of the Conchords
In case you missed their strange little musical comedy on HBO, it’s well worth the effort to tune in. I want the DVD.

• “Trapeze” Patty Griffin
An artist who continues to amaze me. The song makes me think of being stuck on a very delayed airplane trying to get back to Atlanta from NYC.

• “Give It To Me” Timbaland
Pure pop cheese, but I couldn’t get enough of it.

Update: Purchase the above playlist (or a large chunk of it, anyway) as an iMix on iTunes.

just like christmas

2007-12-20T12:51:00.000-05:00

Four days till Santa Claus comes. To help you cope, here's my annual collection of holiday tunes. I've been putting together these Merry Mixmas CDs (off and on) since 1999, but I've never before offered up the full playlist online. Let me know your thoughts.

Tracks:
1 Good King Wenceslas — Joan Baez
2 Step Into Christmas — Elton John
3 Once In David's Royal City — Sufjan Stevens
4 The Holly and The Ivy — Peter Noone & Natalie Noone
5 Christmas Tree On Fire — Holly Golightly
6 Deck The Halls / Bring A Torch, Jeanette, Isabella — Smokey Robinson & The Miracles
7 Little Girl Blue (Postal Service Remix)— Nina Simone & Postal Service
8 Lord Of The Dance — J.J. Sheridan
9 Last Christmas — Scala & Kolacny Brothers
10 Winter Wonderland/Let It Snow — Bette Midler & Johnny Mathis
11 Hibernation Day— Jars of Clay
12 Baby, It's Cold Outside — Jessica Simpson & Nick Lachey
13 Carol of the Bells — The Bird and the Bee
14 Wonderful Christmastime — Paul McCartney
15 O Come, O Come Emmanuel — Belle & Sebastian
16 Good King Wenceslas (Patrick Krouchian Remix) — Cssr State Philharmonic
17 2000 Miles — The Pretenders
18 Merry Christmas Everyone — Shakin' Stevens
19 Just Like Christmas — Low

download mixmas07.zip

step into christmas

2007-12-06T17:15:00.000-05:00

It’s December, which means another one of my drawings for AirTran is now online. This one was a bit, um, obvious I guess. I was on a tight deadline and had to get them something quickly. The color palate is probably a little too doctor's office.

Meanwhile, I've posted a couple of new Blotter illustrations on my Flickr site. The one to the right went with an item about an escaped mental patient who the Blotter diva dubbed "Bad Santa." Said my BF: "Is he supposed to be Santa — or Gandhi?"

And on a final, holiday-themed note, I'm nearly done with my annual Xmas CD. It's been an unusually long process this year, probably because I started putting the playlist together back in early November. (Too early, I know.) Stay tuned and I'll post the whole list on here once it's done.

myriad harbours

2007-11-05T10:14:00.000-05:00

Hello, autumn.
This year's change of seasons didn't come as a gradual stroll into shorter days but arrived as a jarring splash of chilly nights and resurrected cardigans.
I blame it on the cruise. The BF and I spent eight days aboard the Radiance of the Seas in middle October on an itinerary that left out of L.A., went south to Ixtapa and stopped in Cabo and Puerto Vallarta on the way back. It was an Atlantis charter, but we joked it felt more like an Atlanta cruise. We were there with a group of about 14 friends, most all of them from the ATL.
Good times were had by everyone. My only real complaint came after the cruise. I could still feel the boat moving at least a week after returning to land — which is apparently a common side-effect.
I've found it hard to concentrate and get any significant work done since we got back from the trip. And now, all of a sudden, it's November. Thanksgiving is just a couple of weeks away. There are Christmas decorations up in CVS. Fall feels like it's already over. What happened?

Last week I had the chance to catch Annie Lennox at the new Cobb Energy Center. I was impressed with the venue, even if it felt a little corporate and somehow modest in its scope. The performance itself was amazing, as always. She whipped out "Thorn in My Side," one of those songs I absolutely didn't expect, and also did a great rendition of "Sisters are Doing it For Themselves." Beautiful.

The next night found me at the New Pornographers show. I was still feeling a little off from the cruise (seriously) but I really wanted to see Neko for at least a few songs. The band seemed a bit tired to me — oddly unenthusiastic — but Neko did not disappoint. Hearing her belt "Challengers," the title track from their new album, gave me a new appreciation for the song. I also really liked the live version of "Myriad Harbours." After that one, I left. On the long walk back to my car, I could still feel the boat rocking.

power book

2007-10-03T08:23:00.000-04:00

New illustration for AirTran’s Go magazine. The article offered up tips for extending the battery life of laptops. I was going for something Halloweeny.

so you say

2007-09-28T10:49:00.000-04:00

For Friday, a list.

• We’re back from Vegas. It was my first time in Sin City, though the BF and I did more sunning than sinning. Our hotel, the ginormous Mandalay Bay, had a beach/pool/river area that was bigger than my hometown. We barely left the property.

• Thanks to Jerry, I'm now addicted to “America's Next Top Model.” Yikes. My capsule review of the Cycle 9 premiere is here.

• The new “Bionic Woman” really sucked.

• Loving an album given to me by Lucas: Siobhan Donaghy, “Ghosts,” which apparently came out in early summer but I never heard any of it until now. Here’s the video for “So You Say.”

• Scrabulous on Facebook = crack cocaine.

• The latest crime report doodle appears above. I also really liked last week’s.

money can't buy you back the love that you had then

2007-09-14T07:55:00.000-04:00

I normally scowl when I hear that an artist I admire has sold out and is letting their music be used in, say, a cell phone commercial.
But last night I caught the new iPod spot and nearly fell off the sofa: There’s my girl Feist shilling for the new Nanos.
Good for her. The video is amazing and I hope the Apple ad gives her talent some wider exposure.

Here’s the ad:

makes me think of the legion of doom

2007-08-30T13:40:00.000-04:00

For those of you reading in Atlanta, this is your second-to-last weekend to catch the exhibition of Annie Leibovitz photographs on display at the High Museum through Sept. 9.

I’m actually not much of a Leibovitz fan. I find many of her celebrity portraits stiff and oddly uninspired, though this exhibition did include some surprises when we saw it last weekend.
I loved the above image of Dubya’s inner circle (apologies for the poor scan), which is truly one of the most terrifying photographs I’ve seen in ages. Something about Cheney’s smirk just says, “I’m a sociopath!” Condi looks like she’s about to spit hot acid into your eye.

Even better were the many shots of Annie’s longtime partner Susan Sontag, whose battle with cancer plays out in graphic detail across perhaps two dozen photographs (including one taken after her death). Too bad Susan gets demoted to just a “friend” in the accompanying text. Any fool can tell that these two women were more than friends, and Leibovitz’s shots of intimate moments with Susan and their children show an emotional intensity that I found lacking in most of the magazine work.
Anyway, it’s worth a visit. That Bush picture alone will haunt me for months.

baby’s first xanax

2007-08-29T09:24:00.000-04:00

I haven’t posted any new artwork on here in a while, so here are two at once, both taken from the Loaf’s crime reports.

In the above, I had fun playing around with gradients and transparencies in Illustrator, which led to some unusual colors for me. The BF declared it “very Southwestern — but I like it.”

I struggled with the composition in the drawing below. I’m still not in love with the final, but my original idea — to place the sleeping grandpa on the far left and play the baby huge in the near right foreground — just didn’t work at all. The item from the Blot involved a babysitter who dozes off on the job, apparently due to too much Xanax. Some eagle-eyed (and pill-popping) readers might point out that Xanax is not a capsule, but it just didn’t work as a tablet.

a birthday, a wedding, a funeral

2007-08-28T09:34:00.000-04:00

“I’m anxiously awaiting a new post,” someone said to me the other day, and I sort of shrugged. I haven’t paid much attention to this blog lately; I’ve been knee-deep slogging through actual life with not much time to stop and pontificate on what it all means.

The BF and I spent eight glorious days in Provincetown celebrating my close friend Jimmy’s 30th birthday. (As a side note, when did all my friends get so f-ing old? Every time I turn around someone’s turning 30, and in October we’re celebrating another friend’s 40th. Lord.)

The week couldn’t have been better. Perfect weather, lots of laughter and lots more liquor. Ptown isn’t exactly known for its nightlife but we managed to hit either A-House or the Crown every single night we were there. At this rate, my liver might not make it to 40.

On our final day of the trip, the BF and I left our crew behind and mounted the long hike out to the beach. If you’ve never been to Ptown, you may not realize what a commitment this entails. The beach is beautiful once you get there, but it requires an almost comical trek through the wetlands to reach the area where the gays gather.
Once we were there, I wanted to rest, but the BF was chatty and affectionate. I soon found out why. He was trying to figure out a way to pop the question. He’d planned the whole outing and had a ring hidden in our backpack.
No one believes me when I say I didn’t see this coming, but I seriously had no idea. We’re not sure yet of the specifics but considering a ceremony next spring or summer. Details to come.

On a more somber note, we came back to ATL and were met immediately with some grim news, reports that our friend Todd had died over the weekend. This is a person we traveled with to Mexico back in December and have seen often this summer, one of the few guys in Atlanta that my BF immediately clicked with. He was one of the most consistently upbeat and positive people I’ve ever known; unlike me, he was nice to everyone, always welcoming, eternally generous.
This is the first friend I’ve lost since high school and I’m still going through all the expected stages: disbelief, shock, anger, numbness. We attended the funeral on Saturday and I was moved by the pastor’s homily, which was personal and authentic in a way that too many eulogies are not. He spoke of Todd’s passion for life and his love of travel. He pointed out how difficult it is to find a photo of Todd where he’s alone.

I’m still trying to wrap my thoughts around all of this, to find the unifying lesson to tie all the events of August into one neat bundle. Maybe there isn’t one that’s not totally artificial. Life is beautiful, life is hard.

studio stick up

2007-08-03T09:43:00.000-04:00

A new crime report illustration from Creative Loafing. The item involved a guy who was robbed of all his recording equipment — by a friend who was in his place recording a song at the time.
I based the assailant (partly) on memories of a guitar player I knew when I was a teenager, though I really couldn’t imagine that guy pulling a gun on anyone.