What I did on my New York Vacation part B

The main impetus of my trip to NY was that Three Dollar Bill was nominated for album of the year in the OutMusic Awards. As many know, I've been a friend and fan to 3DB for many years. Also, there was a period where I thought I might actually be in 3DB, but that time, I think, has come and gone. Mostly because the show they played in New York was their last. Y'see, Chris' boyfriend Allen has enrolled in Graduate School in that Sucker-upper-of-cool-people, San Francisco. They are friends numbers 5 and 6 who have moved to SF in the past few years.

Losing one band member wouldn't be impossible from which to recover, but alas, Gerra, the bassist, also quit the band for unrelated reasons. Jane Danger and I discussed possibilties for continuing on with the band, but I think that's a pipe dream as of now. It is possible that I may play some sort of music with Jane one day, but it's all conjecture at this point.

But anyway, getting back to 3DB in New York, here are some images of them playing during the showcase that happened on Saturday night.


Jane trying to look crazy:

Gerra being her naughty awesome self:

Three Dollar Bill on the streets of New York:

One of the things that kinda sucked about this trip to NY was the poor coordination on my part to get in contact with friends living out there. I failed to connect with fun Frank, adorable Mikey and Leidy, vivacious Liz and a couple others. I did run in with good ole Wilson and supercute Koop, but the only picture I got of Koop, because I'm a doofus, is this one:

Marco and I also went to MoMA. I was under the influence of a certain type of cookie, which sort of prevented me from taking many pictures, but here's one of this artist who recently had a couple pieces at the MCA in Chicago. I remember someone telling me about her, but now I don't know her name or anything else about her. Her newer stuff is more organic and sculptural than this piece.


This piece reminded me a lot of street art, though I don't know if the artist has a background in it.

The most memorable exhibit was a series of video installations of Douglas Gordon. My favorite was a large white room with two perpendicular video screens. The film on the screens could be seen from either side of the screens. The two screens had similar but different videos playing on them. The videos were of an elephant in a large white room of about the same size of the room the screens are in. At the beginning, the elephant is on the floor, lying down, but it gets up and walks around. All the while, the camera is circling the elephant at a slow pace. If you were to walk around the white room, circling the two screens, you would be walking at the same speed at which the camera is circling the elephant. This created a pretty odd sensation. You could also walk in the opposite direction or between the two screens (each of which were going in opposite directions from one another) thereby sort of being sucked into the movement of them or, if you walk the other way, being forced away from them (not literally, but your mind feels something there).
When we first walked in, I was simply mesmerized by the elephant images, as I sort of love elephants (they're no rhinos or hippos, but they're sooo great anyway. They just may be my sixth favorite animal!). Marco circled once and came back and told me to circle it and I was skeptical because I thought the videos of the elephants were great to begin with, but I quickly understood just how awesome it was to circle. There were all these people who were sitting down and being static and I wanted to yell at them, but I didn't. Poor people.
On the train, I was mesmerized by this girl's nailwork. So I took a picture. I looked up at Marco and he mouthed "you're my hero." See, he was more fascinated with her cleaning under her nails with her crucifix. At least she found a use for it.

I also saw this kid wearing this backpack:

And also this cute little kitty "guarding" the seafood market in Chinatown:

What I did on my New York Vacation Day 1

So, a few weeks ago, I went to New York.

One of my first visits was to the new Apple Store.

Kinda like the entrance to the Louvre, the I.M. Pei-inspired entrance is a glass edifice with stairs (and an elevator) descending into the subterranean store.

The inside of the store was pretty typical. I didn't buy anything or anything. Of course, we played Which-apple-store-employee-would-you-sleep-with, which is always fun.

There was some sort of Indian celebration going on and this parade of people was exiting Central Park as we approached.

While leaving the park, I noted to myself that in New York, even the way they park the horse-and-carriages is somehow magical, fairy-tale-like. Note how the drivers get the horseys to put their little front hooves on the curb. It's so cute.

Also, I noted this fellow

who reminded me of a painting by Jean-August-Dominique Ingres, called The Large Odalisque.

Also also in the park (but maybe this was Washington park? -I forget), was this installation but my favorite living installation artist, Sarah Sze. The piece is a mirror image of the top of a building that faces the park. If you were to look up right behind you as you look at this, you'd see the top of the building, which, as I said, looks just like this. Except, of course, inside, there's not all these household items arranged neurotically.

Another view:

With my gracious hosts, Andrew and Marco, we explored the new Time Warner building, which is actually two seperate skyscrapers connected by one large commercial shopping/dining base.

Here's an amazing view from the sixth or seventh floor.

me and mike and leslie

me and mike and leslie.JPG, originally uploaded by bhofmeister13.

Last night I went to see Leslie Hall, the girl who makes that video "Gem Sweater," at Funky Buddha, in Chicago. It was a great time. I'm sure I'll be posting more later, this is just a taste.

Hello Mac

So, I've purchased a new computer and it's a Mac. It's pretty cute. The idea was more productivity, but now I'm on a learning curve and I have less applications, though the ones that come with a mac are pretty righteous. Still, there's the learning thing. I'm getting there though. Also I'm uploading my CD collection. I have about 700 cds, so this'll take some time.

I think I got the new computer just in time. I was downloading something on my old one and it crashed a minute ago. Dumb windows.

So, yeah, I still need to familiarize myself, but hopefully I'll start posting again soon.

Stay tuned.