Pointless Man

Yesterday, I was riding the bus with my son when an urban camper climbed aboard with what I assumed was the sum total of his worldly possessions. "Telling stories to teach lessons about Jedi powers. It's about goddamn time," he was saying as he strode past. After mumbling to himself for awhile, he began regaling various passengers with his dogma. I couldn't quite make out what he was saying until he took his gospel to someone in front of me. "What do you think about my flag?" he asked the cornered passenger, pulling at his hand drawn t-shirt. "What do you think about my cross? Seven stars for the seven continents." He sat down. "See, it's not just about Jesus. I'm the second coming, but I'm beyond Jesus. I'm the resurrection of Luke Skywalker. "I finally cracked the Bible!" he happily declared. "I'm not crazy anymore!"

The background is much darker (and so more readily apparent) and a little more homogenous than in the original. Other than that, what you see is a good approximation of a quick sketch: one of the first I made using Pentel brush pens for inking. As such, it could be worse. The dude in this reminds me (faintly) of a scene I witnessed years ago while on my way to deliver some furniture. First, some set up. The neighborhood of Ballard used to be composed of working class folks and Norwegian retirees. There are still a number of retirement homes, fabrication shops, and small ship yards in certain parts of Ballard, but it is now considered trendy. It is filling up with condos, bars, and hip eateries where houses, dives (mostly pubs), and specialty shops used to exist. If you wander off from some of the major thoroughfares, you'll run into micro-breweries and more popular restaurants, but you'll also see old warehouses, a couple scrap yards, and decrepit roads running alongside disuse...

Shelly had spent 20 years in Second City. Almost her whole life. She loved her hometown without reservations, but she absolutely had to get away and only return for brief--very brief--visits. There were plenty of places to go: Cities with pleasurable summers, liveable winters, fewer corrupt officials, less brutal cops, a dearth of gangs, a sense that toughness wasn't the only important human characteristic. Towns that didn't remind her of her childhood. States her parents didn't live in. Vast expanses of land she'd yet to see. Like another world altogether. And that's what Sammy offered. A near total break from her past. Her man.

and make a stupid atheist point I should be above (while playing on equally foolish religious assumptions, no less): Why couldn't that stupid correspondent for CNN have kicked the bucket instead of Tim Russert? Whaddupwiddat, God? Why you gotta be so unfair, man? ...Unless you don't exist! ... I feel as dirty as a stupid lady standing in the middle of dangerous, oily flood waters.

I was shocked. I remain shocked. Those with an interest in politics and the goings on at the capitol were well served by Tim, at least as much as by anyone else in recent memory. America has lost a great figure and a great service in Tim's death. At the national level, at the world level, it's just one man, just one heart attack. Perhaps not the epic tragedy his colleagues at NBC feel it is. But it is disheartening. I try to be, if not cynical, pragmatic and realistic about how things are in life. I find it easy and preferable to be more rational than emotional (though I admit there are strong ties between those modes). But I'll tell you something.... Unlike much media coverage on the demise of some important personage, little of the reaction seems staged or forced. Knowing how personable Russert could seem, even when dealing with the most important issues of our times, it is easy to believe people were attached to him. Tim Russert had a lot of friends. People are proud to ...

So, I'm not really watching TV, but I have CNN on as background noise while I'm reading. They're covering the flooding in Iowa, and there's a lady standing in the water. I don't care, so I go back to reading. Then I hear her say she had just run into a National Guard unit warning her and others to stay out the water. This gets my attention. The screen flicks from this waterlogged correspondent to an earlier interview, where a guardsman explains that dangerous chemical and biological contaminants make entering the water a bad idea. The view shifts back to CNN's correspondent thigh deep in the floods, telling us, "Yes, stay out of the water." During the segment, I must have heard her, CNN's anchor, and the guardsman repeat this phrase at least 6 times altogether. Stay out of the water. Okay, I figure, she must be wearing some pretty good water proof clothing for this assignment. Then she says, "Earlier, I saw a couple walking through this in the...

Normally, the last bus out of Ballard, the 'night owl' 44, is pretty empty, at any given point carrying five passengers at most. Three nights ago, the 44 broke down one block after I boarded as its first rider. When it was finally fixed, the driver made good time. I didn't mind, anyway. I had nowhere to be at 2:30 in the morning. If there was anyone waiting for that particular bus, they had given up before we arrived. The trip was just me, silent and absorbed with rereading an Italian comic, and the driver all the way out to the UW campus. Buses almost always feature a few characters on them, some more pleasant than others. These sorts of riders tend to be emphasized on late night rides, as their voices carry through the empty seats, and their gesticulations can be seen from almost any spot on the bus. It was therefore something of a relief and a disappointment at the same time to find myself nearly alone then. Not so last night. The night owl felt a bit like a travelling c...