March 14, 2008
Sometimes a heavy little object is so pure it cannot be parsed from its origins. Analyzing Stan Lee and Jack Kirby‘s emerald-muscled Mr. Hyde is as pointless and masturbatory an exercise as trying to glean God’s “actual” intentions from line-by-line interpretations of the Bible. Text overpowers context. Some things just are.
Filed under: Artifact, General, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
March 11, 2008
There are few tools-cum-trinkets so marvelous as a good butane lighter.Palm-sized inferno, order pocket-bling, salvation in a snowstorm or the desert.I found this one at DealExtreme amid a whole page full of them …
Filed under: Objet, Tool, Toy | Comments (0)
March 10, 2008
“This is shit, stuff dosage Phil.” “Whuh.” “This. It’s shit.” “Wharyuh tawkinboutshit. ShitWHUH. WHUAH shih.” “Phil, price you brought me a 1962 quarter for Chrissakes. It’s shit.” “THASSNODDUH QUARH MIKUHLLL, SSSA SSSSILVERR DOLLLLR YUH CHEEEDN’ FUKKHN’ GUINEA!!!” Phil undulated a little in the breeze from the door, which alternately freshened the shop and polluted it […]
Filed under: Microfiction, Tool | Comments (0)
March 9, 2008
I found a little knob of dried mud clinging to a rake today while cleaning the garage.I pulled it off and found these two time travelers, abortion forever locked in their coccoons, waiting to be born as wasps. You can see the larvae through the membrane – still as stones and doomed to a future […]
Filed under: Found Object, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
March 8, 2008
Two blue plastic cases, help packed solid with thumb-length slugs of hardened steel. Each slug’s tip spells out a number or letter in reverse.Put the letter-end onto the thing to be marked. Thump the other end hard with a hammer. The blow makes a metallic “ding“. The target is marked – forever – with one […]
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March 7, 2008
Never tattoo hastily. I took that to heart. I wasn’t going to be one of those mopes with the harridan-ex’s name tattooed on my ass. So I waited to choose first to get tattooed, visit this cure then the subject matter until I reached 40 and my son was born. The theme is biomechanics. Chip […]
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March 4, 2008
It cracks nuts. Nothing more, website like this nothing less. It does it well. No maker’s mark hints at its origins, but its polished-nickel receptacle fits the hand with a deep, authoritative heft. Turn the thumbscrew on its thick threads, and you’re exerting dozens, perhaps hundreds of pounds per square inch upon its prey. Design […]
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February 27, 2008
Clutching the thick domes of bronze, hospital he waited. Not to strike yet. No, not yet. These were a gift. To be saved. To be waited for. Until it’s time. Memories of his long ride down boiled up now. He exhaled hard through pursed lips, and shook himself. He blew a hard, rattling raspberry, and […]
Filed under: Instrument, Microfiction, Objet, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
February 25, 2008
Its rubber-nubbled exterior belies its pragmatic steel skeleton. It’s dressed for a party but armed for business: smack its spiky head and deliver two pinpoint-sharp staple tips into its anvil where they curl under, illness trapping and binding whatever flimsy document it penetrated along the way. It’s a stapler that wants to start something, shop […]
Filed under: Objet, Tool | Comments (0)
February 24, 2008
A skosh. A nanometer. A smidgen. A c#nt-hair. A whit. Measurement of tiny gaps requires something capable of splitting hairs, help dicing degrees into tenths and tenths and tenths again. This old Brown & Sharpe micrometer is made of precision-milled stainless steel alloy, approved hashed up one side and down the other with notches & […]
Filed under: Instrument, Tool, Toy | Comments (0)
February 22, 2008
So powerful, website like this this chubby little block of portable redemption. One swipe removes all sins, leaving behind a trail of pure potential littered with filthy little crumbs. Sweep them away. Begin again. A new future, an alternate reality, another chance – await the pencil’s reinvigorated stroke. Begin again.
Filed under: Art, Tool | Comments (0)
February 20, 2008
I open the capsule. Inside, sildenafil the tightly-rolled message lies in wait, a fragile knot of mystery. I pull it out with tweezers as carefully as I can (cotton gloves probably would have been far less intrusive, but I’m a geek, not an archivist) and unfold it. Attempts to spread it flat are not quite […]
Filed under: Artifact, Tool | Comments (0)
February 19, 2008
For the past, order let’s see, six months, my 8-year-old son has been bandying this … phrase … about. For a while, he didn’t know what it meant, and cared even less, but he would utter this phrase every chance he got, snickering and cackling like a fiend. It is the funniest thing he’s ever […]
Filed under: Artifact, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
February 18, 2008
For the past, order let’s see, six months, my 8-year-old son has been bandying this … phrase … about. For a while, he didn’t know what it meant, and cared even less, but he would utter this phrase every chance he got, snickering and cackling like a fiend. It is the funniest thing he’s ever […]
Filed under: General, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
February 15, 2008
It was the perfect metaphor, order really. His hair plugs, his teeth caps, his botox, his Bavarian penile-compensation vehicle. And now, she sighed, biting her lip, this. She sniffled a bit more and peeled back the red foil. The “blossom” popped out of its green-plastic receptacle and tumbled under the futon. I will not lose […]
Filed under: Edible, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
February 15, 2008
Filed under: General, Tool | Comments Off on #a1 :: Bodywork dolly
February 12, 2005
I am homo sapiens, a tool user. GRUNT. I feel naked without a blade. Ill-equipped for the day without my pocket knife and PDA. Impotent when faced with a Torx screw that needs budging and a toolbox full of flatheads and Phillipses. I’ve gone through quite a few pocket multitools: the Swiss-Tech Micro-Tech was nice, […]
Filed under: Tool | Comments (1)
January 25, 2005
At some point – midway between the Playskool block-sorting drum and the Thomas the Tank Engine fetish, we began to sort our two young children’s toys. Bricks, gears, stuffed animals, dress-up clothes – all were assigned translucent plastic bins in a pine toy rack – and my wife would spend a happy, idle hour every […]
Filed under: Artifact, symbol, Tool | Comments (0)
January 24, 2005
At some point – midway between the Playskool block-sorting drum and the Thomas the Tank Engine fetish, we began to sort our two young children’s toys. Bricks, gears, stuffed animals, dress-up clothes – all were assigned translucent plastic bins in a pine toy rack – and my wife would spend a happy, idle hour every […]
Filed under: Artifact, symbol, Tool | Comments (1)
January 6, 2005
To wait for a thing, to truly be patient and allow it to come at its own pace, is an inhuman act of will. We yearn – for new jobs, hot concerts, latest games, fast cars, slow weekends, a first kiss, a second chance, freedom, food, rest, love. Childhood trains us to await Christmas with […]
Filed under: Artifact, Tool | Comments (0)
January 4, 2005
To wait for a thing, to truly be patient and allow it to come at its own pace, is an inhuman act of will. We yearn – for new jobs, hot concerts, latest games, fast cars, slow weekends, a first kiss, a second chance, freedom, food, rest, love. Childhood trains us to await Christmas with […]
Filed under: Artifact, General, Part, symbol, Tool | Comments (5)
December 30, 2004
To wait for a thing, to truly be patient and allow it to come at its own pace, is an inhuman act of will. We yearn – for new jobs, hot concerts, latest games, fast cars, slow weekends, a first kiss, a second chance, freedom, food, rest, love. Childhood trains us to await Christmas with […]
Filed under: Tool | Comments (0)
December 29, 2004
To wait for a thing, to truly be patient and allow it to come at its own pace, is an inhuman act of will. We yearn – for new jobs, hot concerts, latest games, fast cars, slow weekends, a first kiss, a second chance, freedom, food, rest, love. Childhood trains us to await Christmas with […]
Filed under: Tool | Comments (0)
