The Obligatory Frank Chu Post

If you live in San Francisco and you don't know who Frank Chu is…you're doing something wrong. Even if there is a slight chance you don't know his name, you've probably seen him walking around the downtown area carrying his sign which states his protests of a number of subjects. Frank even has his own Wikipedia entry.

-Sigh-  Go ahead…I'll wait…..

I happened to be unintentionally following Frank one day when I looked up and noticed him, and it occurred to me that as a blogger in San Francisco it was practically an obligation to write something about him. I mean, Frank is all about media coverage, although I doubt he will get much from my blog. Also, I felt I could bang out a short post about it that wouldn't hang in limbo like many of my other posts. Besides, I'd rather get random site hits from a Google search of "Frank Chu" or "crazy sign guy" than resort to cheap tricks like link-bait posts about Lindsay Lohan sex tapes.

I am a little disappointed that Frank rents out the back of his sign to advertisers (for $100 a week). I feel it sort of dilutes his message, whatever it is, but I guess a guy has to eat and buy day-glow lettering somehow. I guess I shouldn't project my idea of "protesting" upon him.

I considered taking a picture of him with my iPhone for this post since I was so close, but I decided Frank would be my debut sketch art piece for the blog.

Yeah, I have a long way to go to get something in MOMA, but you can at least tell who it is…I think.

Creative Impotence

Other than the title, we're just going to skip past further sexual metaphors and references that may be hanging there ready to drop. Anyone who follows this blog knows it doesn't get updated all that often, much to my own dismay. In my defense, I'm also trying to write for four other blogs, some which may actually produce revenue at some point. Currently I have four drafted posts for this blog that are about half finished, and a few waiting in the back of my addled brain ready to disgorge themselves.

I said no sexual references, so stop thinking what you are thinking now.

So as far as writing goes, it is less impotence and more impetus (you're on the web, go look it up). However, I decided that getting these things posted wasn't difficult enough so I decided to add another level of complexity. Since I like to add a photo with each post, whether relevant or not, I thought I would mix it up by drawing the images myself in order to stimulate my visual creativity (and save time flipping through Google images). My inspiration comes from the blog CHAOS, NONSENSE & TOURISTS whose author frequently features some of his own drawings. Ignoring that fact that his drawings make feel completely incompetent, I figured it might at least encourage me to draw more since I haven't done any significant drawing since college.

"Well, at least I know I can draw boxes."

Here is where we get into a real problem. I suffer from "white page syndrome". I'm sure many people know what I'm talking about, but an interesting note…there is no official definition of it; none that I've found anyway. For me, the problem is much more prevalent in drawing than writing. Making those first lines on the paper can be an arduous process. Add to that the fact that I'm generally never happy with the results even after I get started. I had a discussion with President Wishnack about this and he claims few people ever end up drawing exactly what is in their head, so I guess my problem is that I'm too OCD not to care. I'd be more than happy to take part in an experiment to hook up a human brain to a photocopier or laser printer.

So what I guess I'm saying is, be prepared to see some really crappy art on the blog. Or a lot of LOLCATS.

IZ GOTS NO KAPSHUN!

Dangers of Modern Household Cleaning Products (or Why I'm Going to Sue Febreze)

According to data reported in 2002, accidental injuries, many at home or the workplace, were the fifth leading cause of death in the U.S.

"[...] causing as many as 20,000 deaths, 7 million disabling injuries, and 20 million hospital trips in the U.S. each year."

And this was in 2002! While we may all take this for granted, how many of us just attribute this to "people being stupid"? Yes, I'm sure some of these accidents are candidates for the Darwin Awards, but the truth is that some of these accidents are the result of gross neglect by household product manufacturers.

Yeah, I'm talkin' to you Proctor and Gamble!

So here is my story of victimization:

I had a guest coming to stay for the weekend and you know what that means for the typical single guy, that's right, binge cleaning. I had spent the week previous to the visit putting away various piles of papers and books, or finding creative places to hide them. The last obstacle to tackle...the kitchen. Literally an hour before rushing off to pick up the visitor from the airport, I was taking out garbage, washing dishes, and generally tidying up. The pièce de résistance was to give everything a quick spritz of Febreze to deodorize everything. At this point I should have stopped and headed off to the airport, but being Mr. OCD, I did another quick sweep of the apartment and dashed into the kitchen to throw away some paper.

Once you know that my kitchen has a ceramic tile floor, you can pretty much guess what happened next. I don't know what the hell is in Febreze, but I do know that a small amount covering a tile floor makes that floor more slippery than black ice on a highway. Before my brain had a chance to grasp the situation, my body was playing out a move generally only seen in cartoons. My body's natural reaction to finding that my feet are no longer connected to the ground is to do that cat thing to try to twist and land safely, but since I'm not a cat it typically works out as trying not to land on my head or crush my iPhone. Unfortunately, my elbows and ribs took the brunt of the damage this time and hitting tile didn't help.

That dark spot is a huge, painful bruise that actually wraps around to my elbow.

The twisting action pulls several muscles in my ribs causing periodic jabs of pain. None of this really started to surface until almost a week later after which time I had also attempted bowling which aggravated the rib muscle strain. All of this came as the result of wanting my kitchen to smell nice. This is my punishment for cleaning.

My dilemma now is whether to prosecute the makers of Febreze for not mentioning this on the label in really big letters. In reality, I'm probably to lazy to do this, plus I generally have a low opinion of people who sue large companies for things they have no control over. Somehow I feel this is a little more legitimate than the case where someone dries their cat in the microwave, but do I want to be that person...or retire early before they cut off Social Security?

Regardless, don't expect me to clean up my place if you come to visit.

Thought Of The Day beta 0.3

Who hasn't heard a variation of the saying;

"It takes more energy to frown than it does to smile!"

I suppose it's cute, but somehow also really annoying. Probably because it's the type of thing said by morning people to try and and drag you into their sunshiny view of the world. Personally I can't remember ever looking forward to a morning unless it's one I can sleep through. I'm not saying frowning is better than smiling, but it just seems like a ridiculous thing to say, especially since there is no factual evidence backing it up, according to Snopes.


The fact is, for some people, frowning may actually be easier; especially if they have been doing it for a long time. I don't really think energy conservation is adequate motivation for not smiling. In fact, grumpy people may even be more evolved.


If you really want me to smile, do something funny, like...trip and fall into a ditch. Be creative.

You can bet this guy had NO trouble frowning.