BLAKROC

If you haven't heard the latest album from Blakroc- the collaboration between the Black Keys and a variety of incredible artists like RZA, Mos Def and Nicole Wray- you need to. The album is hypnotic and has the Black Keys' signature blues-rock feel. Check out the Blakroc sessions on their website- amazing. This installment is of a jam session with the RZA:

Julia Lohmann Furniture

Julia Lohmann's work is truly ingenious. After spotting her in the NY times magazine design issue I was amazed at the way she embodies the conflict of loving animals while eating meat through design. She constructs furniture inspired by the "transition of an animal to the product". Her work consists of lamps created from sheep and cow stomaches as well as benches made from a cast of a cows internal cavity and draped in the hide to resemble the animal once its completed. She is highly controversial, even in her home base of England, a country that prides itself on initiating the nose-to- tail cooking movement. What makes her work so endearing is that she is inspired by her love of animals in that her way of paying homage to the animal would be to utilize every part of it.

http://www.julialohmann.co.uk/

Book City Jackets

Last week at the Clinton Hill Flea Market I stumbled upon a vendor selling these truly unique and beautiful book covers. Book City Jackets was founded just last year by Emma Gaines- Ross and Jeremy Schwartz offering "updated versions of the classic paper bag book cover". It was a fortuitous encounter for me since I had used my copy of Benjamin Kunkel's Indecision as a cutting board during our road trip. They are totally affordable and the perfect blend of utilitarian and art. They are there every Saturday and on Sunday they set up shop at the Dumbo flea market.

www.bookcityjackets.com

BSAT World

If you, like us, have a natural aversion to standardized tests and feel that they provide no real validity in gauging a persons intellectual capacity (I don't mean to sound angry, I'm just venting here) then you should seriously check out this site: bsatworld.com. The concept is really ingenious. Its a compilation of college application essays, sat-formatted questions, and admissions stories (my favorite being about a guy who decided to pull a prank and turn the tables on his Dartmouth interviewer), all of which provide an honest discourse amongst students as well as being utterly hilarious.

And I'm Diane Rhem

I found this interesting juxtaposition on the NPR website a few days ago. I actually find this quite beautiful, Mrs. Rhem with her gorgeous head of ivory locks and then that hoary ferret. Even the composition of each image compliments the other nicely and adds to the overall graphic dynamism.

Mouse Appeal

This is a pitiful scan from a page in my drawing pad that came about when Jane and I were high on prescription drugs and drunk on two buck chuck. What you see above is a harsh and absurd attack on girls we deem to be MOUSEY. For some goddamn reason we just love to hate on 'em. I'm thinking it's because we feel that these seemingly unrewarding characters keep getting unwarranted attention, that quite frankly we feel we are more deserving of. Due to this fact, mousey girls seem to have a bloated self-confidence, while Jane and I are stuck grappling with our heightened self-awareness leaving us, on occasion, with a crippling case of "the blues." But as you can't really decipher above, it is obvious that we don't quite know what the hell we're talking about. We do know, however, that they have a big ego part in the center of their brain and a fanatical devotion to Wilco.

Rude and Crude

This is a crude illustration of me drafting the illustration in the next post. I'm over there on the left, drawing pad in hand, kickin' back and enjoying some red wine and a Xanex. Below me is my little red duffel containing the three outfits I lived in all summer and a bag of groceries that Jane referred to as "geriatric food" or dried fruit and nuts (she thanked me later). Over there on the right is Jane reading Indecision by Benjamin Kunkel, also kickin' back.

Nudie Tennis

Ah, this is the result of a conversation Angus, Jane and I had about tennis. Someone brought up naked tennis to which Jane responded "that'd be one floppy match!" I loved that mental image and thought it was so hilarious that I wanted to try my hand at illustrating that mess.

Dock Talk

I'll never forget the time Angus told us about this little maneuver. Sitting on the docks in Sag Harbor after a few cocktails at the American Hotel, smoking our Nat Sherman's and watching the moonlight dance on the water while ducklings send ripples that reverberate across the mercury dappled surface, Jane and I listen contently to Angus's tale of THE PHANTOM!
Afterward we felt compelled to share a trick of our own such as the infamous Donkey Punch, or one that Jane and I coined ourselves, the "Dusty Clock."
Ha, this is actually strangely appropriate that the dock is such a prominent aspect of the memory, and subsequently, the cartoon too. Jane has been begging me to tell her what "docking" is. I just don't feel like going into it though.

Miss. August

Jane has a hilarious knack for attracting unwanted attention from homeless people, be they black, white, male or female, young and old. Still unfinished, here is a rough draft of the beginning of a saga illustrating her uncanny abilities to arouse stifled aggression and ardor without even trying.
We're almost positive that she was featured as Miss. August on the soup kitchen's 2008 calendar.
Stay tuned for more of "Miss. August" and watch the calamity unfold!

Southwest Chief

After less than two days on the train we got off in a small town called Williams in Arizona. A 10 minute shuttle took us to the Grand Canyon Railway hotel where, much to our delight, we were told there would be a 'western show' before our train heading to the Grand Canyon picked us up in the am.

The morning starting with a glorious all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet that was followed by the much-hyped 'western show' which more more like a re-enactment of a shoot out scene from a spaghetti western. From there, the crowd boarded the rustic-looking Grand Canyon Railway. Seriously, this same train has been operating since the 50's.

It was about a 2 hour jaunt from the hotel to the South rim of the Canyon. The serene views of the desert landscape were punctuated by the occasional sing-along and at one point, a mock train robbery.

The train ride certainly had its charm but, as far as the canyon itself; speechless:

We Took a Road Trip

Once Hads graduated from Columbia College in Chicago this past Spring (I myself still have another year to go, but thats another story), we determined that the best way to use the abundance of idle time that summer afforded us to embark on a cross country road trip. Although tentative at best, the plan was for us to take Route 66 from Chicago to San Francisco while making pit stops along the way in New Mexico, The Grand Canyon, Los Angeles and finally a drive up the scenic Pacific Coast Highway. However, because both of us were sans car this summer we had to drum up another means of transportation and fast with the date we were planning to head out rapidly approaching. After ruling out car rentals, whose weekly fees were criminal, we looked to trains as a last resort. And thanks to some shrewd travel finagling by Hads we were booked on the Southwest Chief bound for the Grand Canyon one week prior.

Initially we thought that by opting to take the train we would be missing out but the charm of our sleeper car quickly quashed any of those notions. We had also come prepared with two grocery bags filled with (for the most part) non-perishable comestibles as we were on a strict budget. So, it was a happy surprise to hear that breakfast, lunch, and dinner would be complimentary and on top of that it was not the stock menu of club sandwiches and chips we had anticipated but rather a varied and flavorful assortment of meals.

Undoubtedly the greatest advantage of taking the train was waking up to the Colorado Plains and seeing the New Mexico desert unspool outside the window of the dining car.

As someone who has seen more of Europe than her own country, it's nearly impossible to describe what it was like waking up to this: