Should I Have Tipped?

So this guy came to replace my windshield on my car. I'm not sure how far away he came from but the area code for the glass place was 734 I think, which puts him at least 60 miles away. It could be that he works over here in the 810 but who knows. My insurance pays for it and calls them to come out and take care of it so I figured I didn't need to, so I didn't. But then my mom asked me if I tipped him and it got me thinking that I should have. I usually only tip in restaurants or for valets but beyond that I'm clueless when to tip. Do you tip delivery men besides pizza guys? What about furniture guys? I always offer a glass of water but some people tip them. Is it a faut pas if you don't tip them. The guy who replaced my windshield was a nice guy, I have tipped waitresses for less and this guy is coming to me and I'm not even paying him. I think I should have tipped him. Hopefully he doesn't hate me.


A lot of people are talking about the new Bourne movie like it's the greatest movie ever. People can't stop raving about it. Well I don't see what all the hoopla is about. The movie sucked. It was probably one of the biggest dissapointments of the summer. I don't understand what people see in it. The plot is the exact same as the first two, the way it unfolds is the exact same and it obviously has the exact same characters. The only thing different is the action; it was much much worse. One of the reasons Americans suck so bad is because as a public people think Two and a Half Men is funny (it's been the highest rated comedy for like 4 years now or something) and that movies like The Bourne Ultimatum are good 'action' movies. There was no action in it at all. I just took a poll on aol where 70 percent of people thought it was the best action movie of the summer. Of those 70 percent of people, I can only assume that they are not action fans and they have never seen a martial arts movie in their lives. There was no action at all in the movie, or at least none they showed. The Bourne movies have this way of taking all the action and putting it so close to the camera and then shaking the camera around like the camera operator is having a seizure, and then calling that action. I can't recall them showing a single punch in that movie. Don't get me wrong the first one was awesome. But the second lacked and this third one is the worst. It's a bad movie. If you haven't seen it, save your money and go see Superbad again.














Another dissapointing movie was War. I have been looking forward to this all year. Jet Li and Jason Statham finally team up, are you kidding me? Two bad asses who make real action movies (not that Statham is particlarly talented but his movies are fun to watch as far as action flicks go) team up in one movie. The movie sucked, it was completely plot driven with only about 15 minutes of action in the whole thing. No one got espescially raw in it after the first 15 minutes. The only cool thing was the plot twist that I never saw coming near the end. Don't see it.

To my blogging faithful I am going to have a special segment next week in which I really need your help in choosing my next apartment. I will be posting pictures with pros and cons of each place and will be making a decision within the next couple weeks. This is espescially important because not only am I moving to a new apartment, I'm moving to a new state. That's right, I'm westward bound. I'll be moving to LA at the end of next month and I need anyone's help who's lived there or been there recently. I haven't been there since I was 16 and I don't remember it all too well. I'll keep everyone posted.

As always get your feet off the ground and reach for the stars. Go big or go home. Pain heals, chicks dig scars and glory lasts forever. Carpe diem. Your heart is free, have the courage to follow it.

Life's short, live large. Chigga chigga yeah

-M, p & z

oh ps - i'll do a summer movie recap soon. Also I'll be driving to LA from michigan at the end of sept so if anyone wants to tag along let me know. I won't be coming back but one way tickets are only like 100 bucks so if you feel like road trippin let me know.

Superawesome...

Gangstas,













go see Suprbad. It is hilarious. I saw a midnight screening last night and wasn't dissapointed. Like Knocked Up, I am sure I will see this movie at least 3 times in theatres. It's very very funny.

cihgga chigga yeah
-m

oh ps - blogging may not be as frequent as i'd like for the next few weeks, i'll be road trippin' it while i figure out my life. east coast or west coast? any thoughts. I am gonna take a surfing lesson in san diego though. should be fun. i'll update sometime.

Arts or Crafts...

I am pretty much the worst blogger ever these days. I have been mildly busy and haven't had as much down time as I usually need to blog. I went to my first wedding of a highschool friend last weekend and it was awesome. It's a whole new realm of adulthood when your friends start getting married, espescially friends you still wrestle with and don't seem like they should be ready to tie the knot. Anyways, this topic has been on my mind for a while now and it should inspire a little bit of debate.

I hear that anything can be art, they way the sun sets, a tampon in a tea cup representing women's struggle (from the movie Ghost World), or someone taking a paint brush and flicking it at a canvas. It seems that there is a lot of people who would lead you to believe that art is something not bound by talent or anything at all really; that anything can be art. While it may be art to the beholder, I am going to go out on a limb and say that things like splatter paintings, found art, object art (a shovel hanging from a wire), a plain blue canvas titled "Blue," and thigs along those lines are not art, they are craft. After a recent visit to the MoMA (museum of modern art) I became even more secure in my belief that art does have it's parameters.

Shortly after my visit to the MoMA I went to a reading of a play that is going to be performed at MSU next fall written by one of the professors there (also the director) called "Arts of Crafts." It essentially had the same issue behind it of the difference between art and craft. It's a fine line between the two and often gets people upset when you try and state your opinion about it. This is just my opinion, but like most of my opinions, I'm probably right. Now I'm not going to attempt to define art because I am pretty sure that is impossible, but I am going to define the difference between arts and crafts. I think in order to make 'art' you need to be an artist. Not to say that everything an artist does is art, for example Picasso's sketches that people pay millions for are not sketches, they are doodles. It needs to be who you are. It is a way of life, something that you feel so passionately about that it is how you make your living. It is not possible to be an artist who paints on the weekends sometimes. That person may be a good painter, but they are not an artist. For them it is a hobby or just something fun to do, something they enjoy. I enjoy painting, I have done several of them over the last few years but I would not call any of them art nor would I call myself an artist. I call them paintings. It is just a craft. Bob Ross taught me how to do it on PBS.

Much of what I saw at the MoMA was not art work, it was craft. Someone putting a rock on top of another is not a work of art, it's bullshit. A shovel hanging from the ceiling next to a chair is not art, it is a shovel and a chair. A monochromatic canvas, whatever color it is, is not art. These things for the most part are not even crafts. Me doing a splatter paiting, that's not art - it's a craft. It looks cool and maybe if Jackson Pollack did it people would think it was art but it's not (which is another topic to discuss later). I'm not a fan of Pollacks but I can admit that he is indeed an artist. Why him and not other splatterers you ask? I've been on the fence about him for a long time but I think that his work evolved into what it was and he was the first to do it (or at least be famous for doing it). His paintings are actually progressive and innovative and inspired (for the times). The painting at the top of the blog is a famous one of his and while it is pretty much a jumbled mess that no one can find meaning in without being full of shit, it is art nonetheless. There are few things as annoying as people trying to explain what art is and why it's meaningful as a piece. The truth is that no one but the artist knows what his painting (or other form of art) means and any assumptions or speculations on what it represents are just wrong.












This is not art, it is a plain blue canvas yet for some reason it is hanging in the MoMA, in the same floor that houses a long pink flourescent bulb that is plugged in and leaning against the wall, a black canvas that has a card that says something to the effect of "if you look closely you can see where the black fades into a deeper black and then back to black and there is a point where there is one dot of blue..," a gray canvas, a plain canvas with one line on it and so on. It is the worst floor at the museum.


















This is also not art, it is a printing that belongs on the shelves at Urban Outfitters. I'm not really sure what my point is and I may even seem a little fascist or something, but there is a distinction between arts and crafts and I just wanted to iterate what that was. Anyways, hopefully I start blogging more soon as I am currently finished with school and unemployed. As always, get your feet off the ground and reach for the stars. Go big or go home. Pain heals, chicks dig scars and glory lasts forever. Carpe diem. Your heart is free, have the courage to follow it.

life's short, live large

-M, p & z

oh ps - I will take a picture of some of my 'art work' and post it so you can all see the true difference between arts and crafts. Also I'm currently reading Joe Biden's latest book to figure out some more about him and so far it's pretty interesting. I'll keep you updated.

I'm not the biggest fan of abstract art but I do love me some Miro...