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Dallas, 1982 (They Live), scan of a black and white photo. I stood at one end of a University Park strip center and took a roll of pictures with a telephoto lens. One thing that strikes me about this image now is how huge the cars are. Also, remember antennas? Geez. I thought they were streaks on the scan at first. This looks like a documentary photo from the '60s to me. Very strange time warp.
My Dream (I promise this won't be a habit.)
Last night I dreamed I was a Japanese salaryman, living by myself in a large two story house, and all the light bulbs kept failing. As soon as I screwed one in it would short out, and I was starting to get scared. I went upstairs to see if I could find some part of the house with light, and found a duplicate of myself lying face down on some nail-studded boards, awkwardly trying to wield a hammer. I've never dreamed of myself as Japanese before; the vibe here was distinctly Tetsuo the Iron Man meets Waiting for Godot. Weird. After I woke up, I got online and ordered a VHS copy of Tetsuo, but mostly because I want to own Greg Nickson's incomparable "Drum Struck" video, which is on the Fox/Lorber tape (the dream reminded me I've been meaning to do this).
I have been thinking a lot about going to Japan, though. One thing I want to do is visit the west coast (Akita or Yamagata) so I can eat hatahata. I found out about this from an episode of Patlabor: Mobile Police, where Captain Gotoh dispatches Izumi and Shinohara to Sakata (in Yamagata) for a mission and asks them to bring back a package of these fish as a souvenir, or "miyage." (see Anime Companion Supplement). "Where's my hatahata?" becomes a running joke in the show. At the end the crew has boiled his hatahata in a soup-pot and appears to be eating without him. I do not get the ending of that episode.
Update, 2013: Drumstruck is on Greg Nickson's vimeo.