YOU AND YOUR LITTLE NICK NICK EYEBALLS!

On my way home the other day I deftly avoided the idiot with a big plump marijuana cigarette and a defective lighter -- being easily nauseated by the reek of cannabis, and despising all drug-use to boot, you can understand that though I obviously had a functioning lighter (the evidence being the lit cigar in my mouth) there was no imperative on my part to help the shmoo further down the path of "therapeutic" wreck and ruin -- and nearly bumped into a very large black woman, of probably around five hundred pounds or so, heading in the opposite direction.

Small vessels get out of the way of large tankers.
Always. Basic harbour rules.

It has something to do with distances, the ability to break, and turning radius. Plus, of course, Newton's laws of motion.


"Force equals mass times acceleration."


What this means is that it takes more energy for a very large object to either decelerate OR change direction than a smaller quicker middle-aged man with a cigar.


Large black women should not have Hello Kitty tattooed on their right breast. Also their left breast. Either breast. Anywhere.
It just isn't a good idea.


My life flashed before my eyes.
Massive Kitty looked murderous.
As well as mighty unstable.

Thank you, Sir Isaac Newton.



It strikes me that I am damned lucky to have a small Chinese American woman as an apartment mate, rather than a gigantic football player. Not only do I despise sports, but smaller people are usually more graceful, and less likely to break my collection of pottery objects. These quarters are filled with handmade ceramics, mostly bowls and vases of relatively simple classic shape, with interesting glazes. Nothing garish, none of that weird crap with the tie-dye bleeding sunburst effect. Mostly blues and greens. Some earthy-browns. Some yellows.

My oldest pieces are two brush-jars that Richard Iseger in Tilburg made for me when we were both in school. Pale blue glazes. His fine eye was, now that I think about it, a formative influence.

My father's tastes in art were also formative.

As was the Avery Brundage collection.

Fine-eyed people are a blessing.


My apartment mate, who is a good friend I have known for years, also has a fine eye. For a long time now she has been neurotic about period and costume jewelry. She will insist that it was my persnickityness that educated her, but I must firmly poo-poo that assertion.
Some people have an eye. It just needs to be liberated.

Quite undeservedly, she lauds my little nick nick eyeballs.



The other great advantage to having a small Chinese American woman as an apartment mate is that I need never fear for my life -- which would be a constant if there were a five hundred pound person of either gender rolling through a cramped living space -- or my sanity. Trust me, the presence of a Hello Kitty tattoo on any part of another person's body is a cause for worry. It does not suggest sane and well-balanced, but rather points to a streak of stark raving batshit a mile wide.
Do sane people get Hello Kitty tattoos?
I rather think not.

Frequent exposure to that nasty creature causes bleeding from the orifices and leads to screaming dementia.

Hello Kitty is a curse.
Frightful anathema.
Quite loathsome.
Icky pussy!

*      *      *      *      *

Except, of course, for my Hello Kitty backpack! Which is a stylish item of the perfect size for half-a-dozen briar pipes, two or three tins of pipe-tobacco, tampers and pipe-cleaners, and other necessities for the civilized smoker.

No more perfect man-purse can be imagined.

An accessory in the very best of taste.
Black checkered mini pack.
The height of hip.



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