29. August 2008 by Joe Gergen.

I was just driving home from picking up some wood, and I got behind this panel van with logo with a globe that I thought said “SeverWorld.”  (Actually said ServerWorld, which I thought was kind of lame)

So I’m thinking “SeverWorld”, what kind of company is this. Obviously not in the business of decapitations. Maybe they help relocate you, thus severing you from your old home.  Or maybe they help sever you from your crappy life, like a mobile band of roving interventionists hired by you or a loved (or more likley unloved one).

Maybe they are like the privatized version of witness protection. You pay them to create a new life for you somewhere else after you have effed up your current one. Maybe money can buy you a clean slate.

Or maybe you can hire them to sever someone out of your world. Need to get rid of loser husband, call SeverWorld. Annoying co-worker or boss, call SeverWorld. It’s like calling out a non-lethal hit on someone. Instead of killing them, they get relocated to Bolivia or Zambia. And by he time they get back they are so traumatized and emotionally wrecked they just fall off the radar.

Call today.

Posted in Misreadings | No Comments »

25. August 2008 by Joe Gergen.

I know what the world needs now is not a another blog entry about the MN State Fair but for selfish reasons I will write one anyway.

First, I have a chair and a lamp on display there in the Creative Arts Building. So I’ll take that as a positive. I think they each were fourth place. Though the dark spot in the bottom of my heart that is still filled with, well, you know, dark things, is telling me that the pieces probably got into the show because that’s all that was entered. But we’ll squash that thought back into it’s cold dark corner and move on. So, if you go out to the fair, you’ll know the pieces because they are the ones with curves. Though I give credit to the items that received higher awards in that they had higher degrees of technicality and execution than mine, I believe my designs were slightly bolder and more original.

I will give my one fair highlight, though. We were waiting in line to ride the sky glider across the fair.  It’s basically an open chair like a ferris wheel.  Well, standing in front of us was a couple, a loaded couple. Bumbling, stumbling loaded. Lil Pammie Anderson, as we will call the female of the couple, was being held up by Bubba, the male. One of the ride supervisors tried to convince them it might be dangerous to go on the ride in such condition, but since she was arguing with loaded Bubba I can’t see how she felt that she was going to win the argument. My only hope for the situation was that hopefully one of them would puke or stumble horribly as they got off the ride. Alas, neither happened. You’ll notice I did not wish for one of them to fall off the ride while it was in the air. That would be terrible.

Posted in Permusations | No Comments »

18. August 2008 by Joe Gergen.

Packing peanuts, that is.  If you ever order anything online, you know that everything is sent to you with packing peanuts. I ordered a book. It came protected by packing peanuts.  I appreciate the effort to ensure the safety of my book, but really. I ordered some supplements online.  Two little bottles came in a 10×10 box filled with peanuts.  Would you like some product with those peanuts or are the peanuts just fine? I was tempted to order some circus peanuts online but was afraid I might eat the wrong ones.

It’s an inundation of peanuts. Soon they’ll take up more room in landfills than disposable diapers, which may or may not be worse than incinerating them.

But unbeknownst to me there is an underworld of Styrofoam scrappers (metal scrappers are a whole other story) out there who want your peanuts. My friend Linda gets kudos for pointing this one out to me.  She was cleaning out some old boxes and packages and had all these packing peanuts. So she went out to Craigslist and informed people that she had several bags of packing peanuts for free. Apparently she got all kinds of responses and someone who sells stuff on ebay came and picked them up.  What other subcultures are out there on Craigslist? Hmmm.

So all you people ordering things online and especially you ebay addicts (you know who you are), save those peanuts.  And when you have a couple bags full, let Craigslist know and we’ll save the planet one peanut at a time. 

Too bad there’s nothing to be done with those disposable diapers. Unless there’s some strange world of diaper scrappers out there that I don’t know about yet…or maybe I don’t want to know.

Posted in Permusations, Recommendations | No Comments »

11. August 2008 by Joe Gergen.

I am always being asked where I get inspiration from to design and build my furniture. OK, so maybe I only get asked every 6 months or so.  But you get the idea. Unfortunately I apparently don’t get the idea because when someone asks me I just flounder for some bogus answer about nature and other stuff.  Very lame and terrible. Just terrible.

So I need to come up with a cohesive (and coherent), short answer, or maybe a short, medium and long answer depending on the actual interest of the now captive subject.

First, I think I understand why I always pull the nature card (which is kind of a bizarre twist since I have relatively no interest in nature expect to notice when all the leaves show up or go away. So basically nature to me is “Leaves, no leaves.”) .  It is like nature but more in the sense of natural, or in more precise terms, it’s organic. The process is organic and evolvatory (yes, I know that’s not a word but it seems  more accurate than evolutionary).

So the nature part is the organic process and not the seed of germination. The inspiration must be coming from somewhere else. But where? As Pooh would say, Think, think, think, think.

Ahh.  You see there are certainly random inspirations like a Chinese character, a wrist watch, circus bears, M.C. Escher, Frank Lloyd Wright, boats, etc. But these don’t indicate much of a pattern except maybe a sampling of the items locked away in my brain that bubble up. So maybe that is a pattern. It’s like a toxic waste dump crammed too full and some waste leaks out the bulging sides now and then, drips onto my cornea and burns some apparently intelligible visual representation of its toxic essence. Yes, I think that might be it.

Wow, I thought I was going to write some hooey about math and proportions and negative space. But I like much better the idea of “trailing clouds of toxic glory” as impetus for inspiration. Wordsworth would be proud.

Posted in Designs | No Comments »

11. August 2008 by Joe Gergen.

My friend Richard called me yesterday all excited and left me a message. He was at the St Paul Irish Fair and he had just won the “Best Legs in a Kilt Contest.” He’ll get to ride in the St Paul St Patrick’s Day Parade. Wow, it just goes to show you that you never know where those 15 minutes of fame will come from.

So if we all will be famous for 15 minutes, will you know when it’s come and gone? The information age has created such a wealth of activity out there that your fame may come and go and you might not even know it. Maybe that’s OK though, since fame seems to take a toll on so many famous people.

Speaking of the Irish Fair, I was there on Saturday and saw the Irish Music and Dance Association Workshop Tent. From afar I thought it said “worship tent.” I’m thinking, you’ve taken this a bit far, haven’t you. And anyway, all the real worshipping seemed to be taking place at the beer tent. 

Maybe I need to get a kilt. I could have pictures taken wearing my kilt and standing by my furniture. That might be a good PR gimmick.

Posted in Permusations | No Comments »