disutility function

    ”Happy,” I muttered, trying to pin the word down. But it is one of those words, like Love, that I have never quite understood. Most people who deal in words don’t have much faith in them and I am no exception—especially the big ones like Happy and Love and Honest and Strong. They are too elusive and far too relative when you compare them to sharp, mean little words like Punk and Cheap and Phony. I feel at home with these, because they’re scrawny and easy to pin, but the big ones are tough and it takes either a priest or a fool to use them with any confidence.
    I was not ready to put any labels on Chenault, so I tried to change the subject.

The Rum Diary
- Hunter S. Thompson

“There was one chance left. If he could see, through his shroud, that she was still there, at her post, waiting for him. And if, in his turn, he thought he should display a last act of kindness, and signal to her. One chance that he should remember that time was passing while she was waiting uncomfortably, on this balcony, where perhaps she would stay until dawn. One chance that, because of her, he should step for a short instant out of the artlessness of despair, that he should remember certain general principles of human behavior, of war, of flight, of hatred. That he should remember the pale red dawn moving over his land; the ordinary reasons for living, in the long run, until the end, even when these reasons have disappeared.”

10:30 on a Summer Night
- Marguerite Duras

another in what is apparently a series of machine rejects here at The Office.
this is the back side of a full 8.5×11 piece of paper that was left at the copy machine.

another in a long line of Grand Rapids photos … this one is in a leaking underground pump room.

i didnt actually intend for this to be an “artsy” photo, i actually meant to take a technical picture of the crack in the floor, but the lack of focus, off-kilter geometry of the shadows and my (apparently) trademark “something up too close, kinda off to the side of the frame” occurred anyway, so here it is for you to enjoy

this was found at the office on the back of a page someone printed and then apparently discarded because it’d be bad form to use it as an official memo …

so i stole it.

a few photos taken on my recent trip to grand rapids … i like them, even if i think i’ve taken a couple of these photos hundreds of times

to properly ruin the mystery for everyone who doesn’t already know, these photos were taken at a rail yard that i work at occasionally … this site is an infinite source of beauty everyday i’m there, and i miss it already.

i feel the need to mention that these were taken with a borrowed digital camera, and that this is new to me. i think i only mention it because, well, its quite obvious that these photos are not the same style/mood as those previous and i’m not entirely sure how that’s settling with me just yet.

these photos make me feel like i see a cold hard world out there, while my others, i hope, generally feel warmer. the second impression is more apt and although i like the new style im not sure i like that its my style …

this is a photo from a little while back, im just test-posting to see how photos look around these here parts…which i guess will depend a lot on the photos themselves, eh?