Palm trees

Palm trees have positive effects on morale.

Fly to ice cream

wired.

to the gadget.

drawin christmas cards.

with splashes of banjo in between.

to make a dizzy pony.

heartscrew.

write

wrong

another weekend at the track

pace

aesthetic outburst

"You can ride down an old country road


and see a house painted purple


with Milk of Magnesia bottles
hanging from the tree.


Thousands of them.


l saw that in Florida once.


That man
had an aesthetic outburst.


He just had to say something.


He was desperate,
and the only tool he had


was a thousand Milk of Magnesia
bottles,


which he probably drank
every one himself."

Jim White - Searching for the Wrong-Eyed Jesus.


That's what I wanna have. (The aesthetic outburst, not the milk of magnesia.)

I got a lot a stuff.

i'll have to go back

Sometimes I get distracted.

I usually have folks around who inspire me.

A long time ago I had a folk who not only inspired me, all the fucking time, but also encouraged me. And when I slacked on makin some crappy art, I got chided and harassed and prodded to produce.

I always think of that really fondly.

I'm (sheepishly) motivated by that kinda praise.

Anyways.


I'd abandoned the weeds on this side of the house for a whole month. My little guy, for some reason, insisted on sitting in my lap [aka in my fucking way] while I worked. Possibly THE most awkward way to get the weeding done, but it reminded me of when he was a tinier baby, and would actually sleep in my lap while I shuffled along the edge of the garden.

Somehow we make these things work, and for some ridiculous reason it's worthwhile.

1939

Recently this old race car from the late 30's came into our lives. (More specifically, into our living room.)

It's half novel, and half aggravating.

But everything has a string of other neat things that trail behind it. And one of those neat things is a VHS I found beneath grampa's TV this morning. I popped it in, and it starts with a bunch of old oval track sprint/midget race footage from 1939. In colour. COOL.

But then it goes on to a bunch of home videos from 1939, somewhere in California - some colour, some black and white. I have no idea where this tape came from, but I spent my entire morning being completely captivated and enthralled by these total strangers on the screen. Beautiful lithe women in dresses, lean muscular men in slacks and suspenders, playing at the beach, swimming, sunning, diving, random lawn acrobatics, sledding in winter, play fighting, nipple tweakin, picnicking, slow motion, scratches, grain, splices, and beautiful.

And the video ends with one more race - "all old junkers - Model A's, T's, midgets, Chryslers, Chevies..."

Kinda funny how someone's old home videos can be so f*cking beautiful and inspiring to a complete stranger, 70 years later. But they were. Awesome.

And that's how I started my day.

all together

I came home today to this today.

The street was completely lined with folks out on a giant Sunday drive. And fucking inclusively. Stockers hot rods pickups muscle cars, 20's through 70's, cheesy shit and beautiful machines alike.

I took a video of them all leaving, but it's 5.5 minutes long. (Thasalottacars.) Me n my little fella giggling the whole way through

GOOD.

pretty things are scary

Isn't it funny how, sometimes, the prettier something is, the less we wanna use it.


Fuck that. Enjoy pretty things. Like fine china.

This coffee is soo good.

24 hours of mmmmmmmm

A beer with old friends.
Horsepower giggles.
Sunrooms at sunset.
Sharing port and chocolate.
Hearing a fiddle.
x's and o's
Getting out of bed on a sunny morning
to sit on an old tailgate and pick a banjo
while fillies graze around the truck.
Breakfast that lasts for half the day.
Boxed wine and thrift store shopping.
Good people.
Coming home to pink flowers.



Keep yer pleasures simple...
find yourself feeling pleased.

coolest car club ever

So much for the kickoff--they called the show because it was too cold, and everyone was gone by noon. But I did get there in time to catch a glimpse of this neat old '29 "Snowbird" sedan on the back of a flatbed.

So I had to look it up. And it led me to what may be the coolest car club ever... (literally).

 

The Model T Ford Snowmobile Club.

It's awesome that these ol' things are still around. And it's even better that there's a bunch of people who are actually bringin them out and enjoying them--cruisin the snow in 80-year-old Fords with tracks and skis. YEAH!

 

And if you really wanna nerd out, here's a silent promotional film from 1924 with some pretty cool old footage of some crazy concept snow-car that runs on giant rotating cylinders.

Armstead Snow Motors from Seeking Michigan on Vimeo.

Made me smile, anyway.

what's new

oh yknow... the usual. All sorts of awesome.

I now have TWELVE awesome greeting cards on jennamack.com.

Like this one, which also happens to depict how I feel about my cards:

It's also how I feel when the weather starts getting nicer and the cars come out. Every year in the beginning of May there's a bit of a cruise, and then the first big outdoor car show of the season. It'll probably rain. I probably won't even go. BUT! It's nice to know the kickoff is happening, and beautiful machinery and sunny weather will soon be wrapping us in awesomeness.

This is me, three years ago today, 4 months preggers in my pretty hillbilly pickup, distraught over having to sell it before my belly got so big that I wouldn't be able to push the clutch in anymore, or maneuver out of my driveway without running out of breath. Or even fit behind that big beautiful steering wheel.

I'd also like to say that my unsavory expression has something to do with those dice. Who the hell hangs red fuzzy dice... in a red on red truck? (Not me, that's who.)

While I'm kinda jealous of the folks in sunnier southern states, I have a theory that we get more pleasure out of our fair weather season, because we're in the rain for the rest of the 9 months or so. Yknow, like absence makes the heart grow fonder. Although, maybe it really just breeds a lot of bipolar behavior.

In any case, you gotta enjoy these things while you can.

Big Boy

Came across this lil fella in an antique store recently. Had no idea who he was or what he stood for - just fell in love with him for a few minutes.

His handsome doll-charm inspired my boy to grow a hair-do.

Before:

After:

Thanks Bob.