Poem Rewrites

small, blonde,
eyes are gone.
tiny life jacket
put on wrong.

swollen, wet,
on a steel tray.
smell of rot,
ocean spray.

waxy, white,
ridiculous.
clothing on a
fish foetus.

* * *

Lengthy footnotes....

I wrote this poem years and years ago. And today I started thinking about it again. It used to be titled "Drowned Child", but now that title seems to take away from the "fun" of figuring out the scene for yourself. So I hereby revoke the title. No title. Fuck titles.

When trying to pull the poem from memory, to look at it again, I couldn't remember the opening lines of the second stanza. That struck me as a sure sign that those words were wrong. I ended up having to look up what I'd originally written.

wet, bloated
on surgical tray

That didn't sound right at all. Too clunky. So I spent a lot of time trying to think of another word for "bloated" that would fit. "Swollen" has such a better "dead and drowned" feel to it. And "surgical" was just wrong too. I want the poem to be more descriptive. Surgical just felt too "brainy" and too judgmental for the mood.

Well, what kind of tray is it? So I fiddled with using the words "autopsy tray", and tried to come up with synonyms for "surgical".

As always with writing, the best way to write it out is the simplest way. If I picture a steel tray, I should just say that it's a steel tray. Everything else is gravy, and I want pure bone.

on a steel tray

Often the trick with writing, in my experience, is to stop trying to sound good and work more on getting the scene looking right. It's the difference between trying to look clever, and actually being clever. When a sculptor talks about carving away all the parts of the rock that aren't David -- it's the same thing. In a sense, it's about being true to the nature of reality, and not the nature of how you wish things were.

Not to say it's about objectivity. It's not. It's about capturing your biased experience in a non-biased way. If that makes any sense at all.

on a steel tray

At first it seemed like too many syllables. So I toyed with "on steel tray", dropping the "a". But that felt stupid. Too posed. Too forced. Not quite sensible. The extra syllable still bothers me a bit, but "on a steel tray" fits far better than "on surgical tray".

So after much wrestling, I settled on the above version.

Can you tell, looking at this poem, that this it's something I've given so much time and energy?

God bless William Carlos Williams.

We Stand On Guard For Thee (And Thine Anus)

Bill Ayers tried to visit Canada from the United States. The Canada Border Services Agency refused him access. That's because back in the 1970s, Ayers was a member of the Weather Underground, and he blew up some buildings to protest the Vietnam war. Mind you, Ayers has never been convicted of any crime, but he has admitted to the bombings. And he isn't really sorry for what he did.

Nowadays, he's a university professor, and he was coming to Canada to lecture on matters educational. Presumably the border guards didn't let Ayers across because he's a "known terrorist". Mind you, it's not like they tell you why you're not allowed in.

To quote the media:

A spokeswoman for the Canadian Border Services Agency would not explain the decision to the Chicago Tribune, but said people can be refused entry for reasons ranging from health and financial issues to perceived security threats.

I don't particularly care whether Ayers comes into Canada or not. What bothers me is -- how do the people at the border determine who and what gets into Canada? Ayers has never been convicted of a crime. The stuff he did happened decades ago. He's now a university professor. You'll pardon my saying so, but he's old and slow. So what was it that made him a security threat?

* * *

When I was in my twenties, I was fond of an adult comic book titled Squeak the Mouse. It's a violent, sexy, funny comic. So when I learned there was a "Squeak the Mouse 2", I encouraged a friend of mine to order it. He did. But when it reached the Canadian border, customs noticed the book contained a drawing depicting anal sex. Let me emphasize that -- a drawing. So they didn't let the comic into Canada.

My friend received a politely worded letter explaining the matter. Sorry, anal sex is bad; it hurts Canada; it's not allowed. If he wanted to appeal the decision, he could. It would be a long, drawn out, and pointless excercise.

This amazed and infuriated me. A drawing of anal sex? They wouldn't let that cross the border? Really? Why? Who was this supposed to protect?

Here. Look at this.

1. 8----o O

2. 8-----)

3. 8----o O

That's a penis. It entered and exited an anus. (In case you missed it, there was penetration on line 2.) If I print it out and try to send it across the border, will it be stopped?

* * *

Little Sister's is a lesbian bookstore in Vancouver. They order a lot of porn from the States. Sometimes books are seized and not let into Canada. Meanwhile, big chain bookstores order the exact same books and receive them without hassle. Little Sister's fought the injustice of it all, and lost. The end result? Canada Customs can seize anything they don't like, refusing to allow it into Canada.

Coincidentally, border guards have a habit of targeting gay and lesbian material. That violates the Canadian Charter of Human Rights, but nobody at Canada Customs seems to mind.

Perhaps Canada Customs has yet to hear of this thing called the Internet. Using it, I can look at all the anal sex I want -- gay or straight, drawings or photographs or videos. I can also read all sorts of disgusting and offensive pornography. Hooray for the Internet!

Mind you, I'm a little worried to make this point. Instead of letting books and comics into Canada, the border brigade might start arguing that they should control what happens online. Never underestimate a bureaucrat's lust for power.

* * *

Conservatives seem baffled by the Ayers case. The guy is a known terrorist, they argue. Terrorists are bad. Don't let terrorists into Canada. This isn't even the first time Ayers was refused entry. Where's the issue?

Here's the issue -- I am irritated when some pissant bureaucrat decides who I can associate with, and what I can read. Ayers was never convicted of anything. The actions he took happened in the 70s. Most people seem to agree that the Vietnam War was a "bad thing". He's now a respected university professor. Does anyone seriously believe Bill Ayers was going to come into Canada and blow something up? Refusing his entry was an empty, symbolic gesture. Utterly pointless.

The real issue is, how did the Canada Border Services Agency decide to block Ayers? How do the people guarding our borders decide anything? And is there any way to drag them out of the dark ages and into the 21st century?

John Akpata Interview

I've been trying to sell this piece. And now I am ready to give up on selling it. I like the story the way it is -- the length, the dancing around, the oddness. I think it's a little too straight for the pot magazines, and a little too potty for the straight magazines. So I've been sitting on the story, not doing much with it. And now I just want it out there for people to read. Why hide it?

It's weird -- I write for me. The whole aspect of finding a publisher just feels like a huge pain in the ass. I'd rather just write and write and write. And paint. Getting published is a whole other skill set, and something about it interferes with the writing.

As always, any feedback would be appreciated.

Super Marijuana Man: Interviewing John Akpata
Wednesday October 22nd, 2008

In anticipation of interviewing John Akpata, I turned to my friends. What would you ask a famed Ottawa poet? Specifically, a poet who ran for MP three elections in a row as the Marijuana Party candidate? A lot of people couldn't think of anything. A few pals jokingly asked if John could hook them up with killer weed. But one Conservative person, quite familiar with John, wrote me the following in email:

"I'd ask him when he plans to stop wasting his life and put his considerable interpersonal talents to use in making the world a better place."

Harsh. But really, that question is a compliment. To rephrase it slightly: "Hey Superman, when are you going to start pulling burning cars off of people?"

You see, John was bitten by a radioactive spider. Or maybe he was struck by lightning. Or maybe there was an explosion in a library and he absorbed the energy of a thousand reference books. His origin story isn't entirely clear, but there's no denying it -- John Akpata has super powers.

Whether he's debating fellow politicians on stage, or slamming out poetry, the man is gifted. Jen Hunter, who ran for the Greens in Ottawa Centre, says that when John is at the debate he "raises the bar." All the speakers have to bring their 'A-game' and match John's passion and wordplay. During his 2006 victory speech, MP Paul Dewar went out of his way to thank John Akpata for participating.

Politicians take him seriously. Maybe the public should too. But the real question is, does John Akpata take himself seriously?

John and I sat in Chez Nam, a quiet Vietnamese restaurant in a basement on Booth Street. It has an excellent vegetarian selections -- good thing, because it turns out John is a vegetarian. I was in for another surprise.

"I don't drink alcohol, so I'm not killing off my memory cells," he told me.

Earlier that day, the newspapers headlines warned that bad economic times are ahead and we're all going to have to tighten our belts. Maybe that's why John and I were the only people in the restaurant. The quiet allowed us to talk endlessly, our waiter unabashedly listening in. Who could blame him? Our talk ranged from the backrooms of political debate to shamanistic drug use.

Having just finished his third run for office, a lot of people ask John, "What's next?" or "Now what?" When John talks about this, he seems mildly befuddled. He's got a lot of plans, but it's hard to choose one.

John said they ask him, "What are you going to do with all this knowledge? This experience? This information? It's useless if you don't pass it on to other people. Okay, I'm in the process of doing that. I'll do interviews, I'll put stuff up on YouTube. We'll see what happens."

But he knows that's not enough. He wants to write a book about how the political system works -- maybe something short, 100 pages, the sort of book that would have a place in schools. He wants to start a new political party -- the Greens have the environment as their main issue. What if there was a Canadian Human Rights Party? That idea really appeals to him. Meanwhile, he continues to write poetry -- he told me he was working on a poem about the human genome, and recently spent three hours watching online documentaries for research. Okay -- he watched the documentaries and smoked pot at the same time.

But John sounded vaguely dissatisfied with all these schemes. He seems to feel they're too small. Something has changed in his head. His mental muscles are aching for a bigger challenge.

When John first ran as a Marijuana candidate in 2004, he did it as a lark. Something fun. Maybe he could sell more poetry, get a bit more exposure. Despite his experience as a performer, he worried about standing up next to politicians.

"John, what are you doing?" he asked himself in those days. "You don't stand a chance against these people. They're going to be more intelligent, more articulate, they've got the facts, they've got the information. And they're going to break it down in a language everybody can easily understand. And they're going to ROAST YOU."

He was waiting in the green room before his first televised debate and all the other candidates were making jokes about marijuana -- at John's expense. They needled him with half-funny digs. John kept quiet, watching them. They were led out to the room where the debate was being held. There was time for just a little more chatter as they were hooked up to microphones and given glasses of water.

"David McGuinty was on the far right end -- and he hadn't made any marijuana jokes yet," John said. "And then finally he made one last little comment. And as soon as he said it, the words had just barely gotten out of his mouth, I said, in a very loud, clear, military style voice:

"'I find it extremely disconcerting that every single candidate has made jokes about criminal behaviour and has ascribed that behaviour to me.'

"This is thirty seconds before the cameras start rolling. And when I dropped that, David McGuinty maintained his composure. But I looked over at him and I saw a little trickle of sweat going down. And I'm like, 'Oh my god, the cameras are ready to roll and these guys are afraid.'"

In the 2008 Glebe debate, John was seated on stage next to Brian McGarry, the Ottawa Centre Conservative candidate. John peered over Brian's shoulder and saw some kind of notebook. There were tabs Brian could flip to, as needed.

"One was 'intro', and then 'housing' or 'healthcare', and the final one was 'arts'. And that was the one he flipped to first There were ten 3 or 4 sentence blocks of things that he should say when people are criticizing him."

Back in 2004, this sort of thing made John panic. "Where's my book? No one wrote something for me. I'm screwed!"

In 2008, he knows the politicians don't write these scripts for themselves. The party writes scripts for them. They're the prepared speeches telemarketers use -- the kind of talk that make a politician stiff and awkward.

John has a big advantage as a poet: "I've got my stuff memorized. I've got a small part. I get to say what I want. So I've already written my lines."

These events were revelations -- politicians are human beings. They often puff themselves up with feigned authority and expertise, but really, John is just as good as they are. In fact, he's better -- because he has poetry and passion and performance. What have they got, besides fancy suits and a little more financial backing?

Almost despite himself, after three elections, John Akpata started taking politics more seriously.

His poetry was what led him here.

"I wrote my first poem when I was eight or nine. I wrote a poem for my mom, for her birthday. I typed it out, put it in an envelope, gave it to her. She loved it. At that time, I realized, hey, I can express my thoughts and my feelings, and I can write it down on paper, and give it to people, and they will understand my feelings and my thoughts. That's awesome! And I never wanted to do anything else."

In the years following, he's won several competitions and travelled to London and Chicago to participate in poetry events. His poems have taken him far. And while he knows he's talented, he has a few stories that keep him going -- events where his words changed someone else. The tales serve as helpful reminder when the going gets rough.

John was at one poetry show. It had just ended, and he was talking to people, selling CDs, hobnobbing with other poets.

"There was this one man who was so out of place at this show. Six foot four, great big huge man. Huge hands. He was off to the side. He waited for everybody to be gone and he came over to me and he said, 'Hey, John, I love your stuff. I want to buy a CD.'

"He bought a CD and I signed it for him.

"He said, 'I've got to tell you something. I'm fifty-two years old. I have a 200 acre farm. All my kids went to college and university. I have chickens and pigs and cows. I have a tractor. I can do mechanics, I can change my oil, I've assisted in the birth of live animals before, I chop my own wood' on and on and on. And then he said, 'But I can't read. I can't write a birthday card for my own kids. So don't ever stop doing what you're doing. Because it's really important.'

"That hit me really hard, because here's this man who grows food, who can fix his own tractor -- I can't do that. He can probably build his own barn. Reach into the cow and turn the calf around if it's backwards. He knows what shots to give. He can handle money and everything.

"And he's telling me he can't even read a cereal box and it breaks his heart every day. He feels embarrassed and ashamed and sad that he's missed out on something. And he took my CD."

As John told me this story, his eyes teared up, and his voice broke slightly. This memory moved him deeply.

In another story, John was part of a poorly attended poetry reading.

"I did a show one time, there were guys staying at The Mission, they got out of Kingston on good behaviour. They got points for all these community activities that they went to. So these guys came to a poetry show so they could get points.

"It was the craziest and worst show I ever did, because there were nine performers there, but there were only two people in the audience. And the two people in the audience were there because they had to be there for probation.

"About three weeks later, I'm sitting in a coffee shop with a friend and one of the guys walks by. He looked like a big biker kind of guy. He comes up to me and he goes, 'John?'

"And I'm like, 'Y-yeah?'

"'I saw you perform at the show over there!'

"'Yeah, yeah, I remember you.' He's a huge biker guy, one of two people.

"And he goes, 'Man, you've got an extraordinary mind! Don't stop doing what you're doing.'"

John described the farmer and the parolee stories as "two awesome experiences I will always use to prop myself up, when I feel down." They remind him of the skill he has been honing his whole life.

"Poetry is like martial arts," John said. "It's ancient, it's old fashioned, it's from the past, it's respected. Once you learn how to do it, it will permanently change your mind set. If you're a karate expert, you're not intimidated by people."

"Writing poetry and performing poetry has given me a lot of skills that federal politicians don't have. The ability to think on your feet, the ability to improvise. You might never make a lot of money, as a poet. But if you are a poet, it shows you have some sort of skill in writing, and some skill in your mind, that other people just don't develop."

"Politicians, you see them reach for words, you see them stutter, you seem them scrambling... You can see the gears and the smoke."

But if John is so great, why run for the Marijuana Party? Many see the party as a bad joke. John says it's because the Marijuana Party has one plank in its platform -- pot is good. Beyond that, candidates are free to speak as they please.

"The others are at a disadvantage. They have to toe the party line. They have to stay within the rules and boundaries. They have a party whip that will discipline them if they say something they're not supposed to say. No one tells me what to do. I can show up and say whatever I want, unscripted. And there's no negative repercussion whatsoever on my head. Zero."

Some people perceive him as little more than a court jester at the debates.

"That's what everybody wants me to be," John said. "But then I talk common sense.

"It's the best political costume to wear. They don't take you seriously, they think you're a joke, they've got nothing positive to say about you, and then you show up and you're the opposite of what they want you to be.

"I'm an intelligent, sensible person that understands what's going on, and can break it down. And I don't make stuff up and I don't lie to people. I'm just trying to tell people the way it really is. As opposed to coming up with all these pie in the sky hypotheticals. And that's what people want. Because that allows them to make better decisions.

"The court jester thing? I've fought against it enough times, and it's just like racism. It's not true! So, you've just got to go through it and prove to them that it's not true."

"You don't have to take me seriously. You just have to take the words that come out of my mouth seriously. You just have to take the issues seriously."

John has an image of what the perfect politician would be -- a weatherman.

"I appreciate who the weatherman is. Everybody likes the weatherman. The weatherman is a very popular figure on TV. Why?

"'It's going to rain today. Bring an umbrella.'

"He's not creating the weather. He's not selling you an umbrella. He's just telling you what's up. That's what we need in politics."

Besides the freedom it gives him, there's another reason John likes running for the Marijuana Party. He genuinely believes in the power of the plant and its cause. He personally believes decriminalization is the way to go. And John's not alone.

"Fifteen out of the sixteen federal political parties agree with the Marijuana Party -- legalize or decriminalize," he told me.

The sixteenth political party is, of course, the one currently running our country -- the squarest of all the political parties in Canada, the Conservatives.

John admitted to me he's been smoking pot almost daily for four years. At the same time, he said, "People think I smoke way more weed than I actually do. I'm more like a teetotaler."

So why does he smoke? That question led John to give me a super hero origin story, of sorts. When he was 26, John had a misaligned jaw and decided to have surgery to correct it.

"They opened my mouth, they cut my gum line, they pulled my face off, they cut my chin in two spots, and cut my jaw in two spots. They actually removed a small section on each side. They lined everything up and bolted it in place."

The many doctors he saw told him he'd have to take Tylenol 3 and liquid codeine to deal with the pain. So John asked them all -- "my doctor, my dentist, my anesthesiologist, my oral surgeon, my nutritionist" -- if he could smoke "organic cannabis" instead.

"All of the doctors are saying, 'It's a better choice.' Just don't get caught. They couldn't give me a prescription. Well, they could -- but with the licensing system it takes a year to get a license. What a stupid system!"

"When I got out of the hospital I took one Tylenol 3 and five drops of liquid codeine and that was the worst experience I've ever had in my life. And I said okay, I'm never going to take these chemicals again. I'm just going to switch to weed.

"I had a friend, who didn't even charge me. He's like, okay, you're going to have your jaw wired shut for 12 days? Here's an ounce of weed. Smoke your weed when you're in the shower, massage your face, that's going to help the healing process."

It was when he was using marijuana as medicine than he began to learn more about it.

"When you're in a park, smoking a joint, and your face is all smashed up from surgery, people will come up to you and tell you everything they know about weed. And within a very short period of time I got a huge education into medicinal marijuana. 'Oh, my daughter had jaw surgery!' 'My cousin was in a car accident.' That's how I got started."

While the jaw surgery is a nice origin story, it's a little convenient. When you talk to John, he always emphasizes the medical aspects of marijuana. He sees himself as an advocate for the sick, who might not want to discuss their cancer in public. He speaks for the grower, who doesn't want to risk imprisonment by speaking out.

But marijuana certainly has other, less noble uses. And John's face looks fine now. He's not in any pain today, but he's still smoking pot.

"Here's where the Rasta thing kicks in," John told me. For him, pot isn't just medical -- it's spiritual.

"On a physical level it actualizes the left hand side and the right hand side of your brain at the same time. That's the highest faculties of work the brain can do. When you read, when you write, when you memorize, you have to use both sides of your brain, the logical side and the creative side. That is a mindset that the Rastas refer to as reason.

"When I smoke, it's a ritual for me. I enjoy the ritual of the whole process. I don't smoke just for something to do. I have incorporated it into a ritual of reading, writing, meditating, and praying that is extremely important to me. I graduated university with this ritual. Everything I've ever written and published has been through this ritual.

"Whenever I'm on stage, I'm stone cold sober so I can give 100 percent in the performance. But if reading, writing, meditating, praying and smoking marijuana is part of the creative process, I cannot forsake that process and say, well, yeah I would have done the same if I didn't smoke weed."

When I push for specifics about this ritual and religion, John gets vague. He prays to God, but God is "here and here", he says, pointing to his heart and his head.

Does he think of his drug use as shamanistic? Is he using drugs to explore some other world, and bringing back wisdom for others?

John said, "If you experiment with something and then you write down your experiences, that's shamanism. So if you go on the tilt-a-whirl, and you write it down -- what it feels like, and you can explain it to people... 'There's this machine called the tilt-a-whirl. Crazy! Physically it does this, and it makes you feel like this. And this is what it sounds like.'

"Okay, but drugs -- it's all internal. People do want to explore inner space. And I think the natural substances are a great way to do that. But when you start to explore those substances, you need a little backing behind it."

By backing, he means serious intellectual pursuits. Spiritually speaking, John sees marijuana as a tool -- one that many people misuse.

He offered up an example. "Marijuana culture and snowboard culture? Snowboarders understand a few things about marijuana, but they're not doing it in a ritualistic, spiritualist sort of way. They're doing it in a recreational, kind of entertainment sort of way. You burn your spliff on the way up. You sit down, you buckle up your bindings, you figure out where you're going to go, and you go. And you're listening to tunes while you're doing it."

His approach is a personal spirituality, but one he has difficulty describing to an outsider.

"I tell people I'm a voodoo child for real. I make up my own stuff. I believe what I choose to believe. I know what I know and I worship my ancestors. My mum, my dad, my grandparents -- real people. I do the things that they taught me. I do the things I learned on my own."

John ascribes a lot of his strengths to pot. While that sounds good in a hipster story-telling way, I'm not sure I buy it. Many superstitious baseball players develop routines to win games. Artists can be the same way with creativity. I know of one writer who has a hat he always has to wear when he writes. He claims it puts him in the right mental space.

Dumbo the elephant has big ears and can fly, but he thinks it's the magic feather he's holding that allows him to do it. But no, it was never the feather. Dumbo is flying all on his own.

That's a silly children's story, but it has a deeper message. It's difficult to admit to yourself that the power is inside you, that it's entirely yours. It's much easier to ascribe the power to an external thing. A magic feather, a magic hat, a magic plant -- a solid object that can be pointed at and held on to. The insides of a person, their emotional state, their intellect -- that's all too nebulous to be trusted.

If John said he got his creative powers from alcohol, it would certainly be less controversial. Tons of writers think they can only write if they're drunk. They're wrong. And I think John's wrong about pot. I think his impressive creative powers come entirely from inside him.

But John is smart, and he seems to recognize he doesn't need pot as much as he once did.

"The whole marijuana thing, it has given me patience enough to understand really complicated things. It has taken away my fear and apprehension. If you can burn a spliff and meditate and be calm, you don't need to have the weed, in order to do the meditation, and have the calmness."

I suspect someday soon John will let go of Dumbo's feather completely.

Near the end of our conversation, John and I talked about being writers -- something we had in common. In typical John Akpata fashion, he launched into a long, strange, wonderful rant.

"All writers struggle. You're supposed to be meek, and timid, and shy. Even Superman took on the weakest, nerdiest, persona in the universe to hide his incredible power.

"If I'm a journalist and a writer, people will just think I'm a geeky little nerd, that I sit at my desk and maybe go out and get a story. And people won't even suspect that I could be Superman because the image of the writer is so frail and weak and unmasculine.

"But, isn't it funny that Superman chose to be writer? He could reconcile his incredible power with being a writer. That's how all writers are. All of us -- we're Clark Kent and Superman. We have to be Clark Kent, as writers, because we're Superman.

"What other profession can Superman be? He couldn't be a cop. He couldn't be a firefighter -- people would figure it out. He can't be an actor. You can't use your incredible skills as an actor -- people would figure it out.

"As Superman, as someone who has come from across the galaxy to save our planet, what can you do that people will be able to handle? I'll be a writer. I'm the most powerful man on the face of the planet, and I'm a journalist! People can handle that."

John knows he's a super hero. He might not have pulled a burning car off anyone yet, he's getting close to it. Keep your eyes on him.

When I was reviewing my notes for this article, I listened to nearly three hours of tape, transcribing words, reliving the vegetarian Vietnamese meal John and I had shared. In the middle of the tape, I heard John say something. I'd completely missed it while sitting with him in person. The sentence was embedded in John discussing his idea for the Human Rights Party, and he coughed nervously in the middle of the sentence as he quickly mumbled it.

I turned to my partner, Michelle, and asked her to listen to the tape. Did John Akpata say what I think he said? She agreed with me -- he said it all right.

That sentence: "I'm thinking that I'm going to be Prime Minister some day."

Maybe John is entirely aware of his super powers. He just doesn't want to reveal all of his plans to some nosy Clark Kent.

What I'm Doing

1. I'm working on a painting of a man playing the double bass. It's a commissioned work. That's what the buyer asked for. A painting of a man playing the double bass.

When I sketched it out, I realized there was a big empty space in the top right corner. At first I was going to write "Bass is not fish". But when it came time to paint the corner, I realized there was a flying saucer floating there, and that the man was playing his double bass to the aliens inside. There are three aliens in the saucer, looking down out the windows. The man is looking up at them.

The guy who commissioned the work is, thankfully, not too upset about the aliens sneaking into the painting. Which is good. Because you really don't want to piss off aliens. They have technology we do not understand. Anal probing. Enough said.

2. I'm obsessed with a man I call Mr. Blue. He's a man in an antique mug shot I found online a million years ago. I printed out the mug shot, and every now and then I paint or draw a portrait of the guy. No idea who he is. But he's a nice mix of stunned misery and despair that I've fallen in love with his face.

While working on the flying saucer double bass painting, I've been working on a very large portrait of Mr Blue. It's possibly one of the largest portraits I've ever painted. Over the holidays, I went to Wallack's and bought two huge canvases. Suddenly, I find myself wanting big, wide spaces to paint in.

As I write these words, I have whited out Mr. Blue's eyeballs. I'm trying to decide if I want to leave them that way (it's kind of creepy) or redo them in a light blue that will contrast nicely with the harsh red background.

3. While working on the above two paintings, I took the plasticine out and started playing with it again. At first, I started working on a clay model of Mr. Blue. But then I let my brain wander off some place else, and now I've got some sort of spiky demon thing with all these knobs and protrusions all over him.

I've been playing with this demon thing for about a week. I leave it out, and whenever Michelle and I sit down to watch something on TV, I sculpt. I think he's almost done, because I'm not sure what more to do with him.

When he's finished, I plan on setting him up with a backdrop of some kind, and snap photos. Then I'll take him apart. Something is very satisfying about that.

* * *

It's kind of weird for me to have three projects on the go at once. But it's also very soothing. Whenever I get bored or stuck on one project, I can turn to another. If paint starts to get me down, I can turn to clay.

I should probably work this way all the time.

I'll post pictures of these when they're finished.

I'm also half-working on another Vincent the Bartender story. I actually finished writing it, but I'm not sure it's ready. Maybe I put it aside so I could think about it for a while.

Busy, busy, busy.