Author Archive
Dinner at Genghis Cohen in Hollywood
We went shopping most of the day, including ordering a new frame for me to check out from Retrospecs, which is our favorite optician now. We walked over to the Pacific Design Center, which is closed on the weekend, and then to the MOCA gallery. We couldn’t decide where to go for dinner when we […]
June 19th, 2009 by alephnaught
Dinner at Villa Piacere
We had dinner at Villa Piacere, a restaurant on Ventura Blvd. in Woodland Hills. The service and food were quite good; we parked in their spare lot across the street which is daytime parking for a bank – the bank locked the gates on the lot but the restaurant sent people over to unlock them […]
June 16th, 2009 by alephnaught
Marks and Meaning (M+M) 0.5
•   Title: Marks and Meaning 0.5 •   Author: Dave Grey and friends •   Paperback: 382 pages •   Size: 6″ x 9″ This book is available as a PDF file because its not done. This book may never be done. The book contains a mix of typeset material, hand-written and drawn material, and open areas to […]
June 14th, 2009 by alephnaught
Séraphine
We saw the movie Séraphine today. The movie is about Séraphine de Senlis, a famous French “modern primitive” painter; you can read more about her here. The film is dark, mirroring her internal landscape; there is very little dialog, again mirroring her psychological state. She works as a cleaning woman and paints because God and […]
June 13th, 2009 by alephnaught
Burbank, Ikea, duct tape wallets and cardboard creatures too
We decided to run errands today, especially a trip to the Ikea store in Burbank, CA. First off, I’ve switched wallets – the leather one I bought in Italy is starting to wear out, so when I ordered some stuff from ThinkGeek, I figured I’d try a duct tape wallet. it works! It snaps shut […]
June 7th, 2009 by alephnaught
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
Aviva and I wanted to see the current show “Pompeii and the Roman Villa: Art and Culture Around the Bay of Naples” so we dropped Basil at his sitter’s house and drove to the museum. A car with the license plate HEATHER – made me think of the movie “Heathers” On the way into the […]
May 29th, 2009 by alephnaught
Office toys (some new, some old)
I have quite a collection of toys in my office – I like to have things to look at and play with when I need to think. Creativity often surges when you take your mind off the problem and let your thoughts operate independently. Here’s a picture of the credenza behind my desk: I got […]
May 28th, 2009 by alephnaught
The Culver City Art Walk
We decided to do the Culver City Art Walk today – a bunch of galleries open their doors to the public along La Cienega and Washington in Culver City. A pretty cool billboard – wonder what its selling? Painted exterior of a non-profit on La Cienega Mao in lights in front of Maloney Fine Art […]
May 26th, 2009 by alephnaught
I won table topics!
This week I won Table Topics at the Navigators Toastmasters meeting! My question was, “What will your summer vacation be?” – since we went to Italy in March we aren’t going anywhere this summer special, but we are doing a lot of things (and a short trip to San Diego for ComicCon, I’m a ComicCon […]
May 25th, 2009 by alephnaught
Memorial Day memories
Stories are powerful things, and Jamie has reminded me of my father who passed away over 20 years ago. He was a navigator helping get transport planes over the hump in Asia (Burma, er, Myanmar to China and back) during World War II. He told me stories of playing Mah Jongg for money (he got […]
June 20th, 2009 by alephnaught