In which We Lose an Email

Huston, I hope you see this, I'm sorry, but I lost the email you sent about the Super Agent Fred art you wanted. Please send it again.

Also, if anyone is looking for free art, absolutely no-cost-to-you art, check out

Super Agent Fred's art

In Which We Are Stumped

 

Every time I feel like I am getting a handle on the website I am creating for Super Agent Fred's art, I suddenly have my ass handed to me.  These setbacks lead to a dance my people call One Fucking Step Forward, Two Fucking Steps Back, Fall Down On Your Face, ChaChaCha.

This all started when Super Agent Fred died, the inconsiderate little pea brain.  And now that I think about it that in itself was a pretty serious setback.  His death meant that SOMEBODY had to deal with all of his art.  How did that somebody turn out to be me?  I'm not sure, I wasn't paying attention, but I suspect it was mostly because of my tendency towards OCD.  But even the most serious OCD can only do so much in the face of ongoing delays.

Let's just consider these complications in order, shall we?  The very first setback was moving all the art pieces over here to my apartment.   As I was wrestling them across town, my initial estimate of how many there are was somewhere around 100.  I have since come to realize that was laughably low.  I keep revising the total upwards, currently I'm guessing there are about 400 pieces.  In case you have trouble with math like I do, the technical term for 400 is A Lot.

Once it was all over here, the collection (which consists of paintings on canvas, drawings on heavy paper, collages, big pieces, little pieces, lotsa pieces) was pretty much a mountain filling up my guest room.  I made a couple of half-hearted passes at tidying it all up, but it remained an overwhelming heap looming there.  That was in late September and I concentrated on ignoring it.

My idea was that I would take pictures of each piece, post them on a website here on blogger.com, and then advertise that site on places like Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace as "Free Art" and hopefully recycle all this art out into the wide world.  I still think it's a good idea, but executing it turned out to be held up by setback number 2, and this is a big one, the fact that I am a lazy slug.

Weeks went by with me putting off the very first step which was taking those pictures.  When I finally realized I would never become the kind of go-getter who would take all those photos, I decided to hire someone.  Setback number three then was finding a photographer and setting up a photo session.  You can read all about that here, but the TLDR version is that once I contacted him, boom, he was over here and finished the job in just a few hours.  Thank God somebody is on top of things. 

So I created the blog and loaded the pictures on to it, a task that only took a few minutes, but which I was able to stretch out over several more weeks, and which we should think of as setbacks number four and five.

And that's where we have currently run aground.  Now that all the pieces are up on the blog, I am labeling each one with its measurements, a description ("ink and acrylic on heavy stock" for instance,) and reference number, so when people clamor for their own masterpiece I will know which one they're talking about.

Setback number 6 turned out to be that when I finally set to putting together those labels, I discovered my "organizational system" of dumping all the pieces into heaps around the room didn't lend itself to tracking down each one of them when I needed to find it to measure and describe it.  So I spent an afternoon actually grouping the works into categories that I could lay my hands on when I needed them.  

It was during this uncharacteristic burst of organizing that I ran across the latest setback, number 7, which was that apparently, the photographer did not photograph all the pieces.  In his defense, I don't think he deliberately skipped some, more likely, the shambles he had to master simply meant that there were some he wound up overlooking.  So now I need to get him back over here to finish. 

I know, I know, I know, you're thinking "mrpeenee, just get on with it," and I will.  But every time one of these reversals rears up and smacks me in the face, I am so overwhelmed, I just take to my bed.  Defeated, I slink out of the guest room, lie down with Toby curled up next to me and his little head on my shoulder (so fucking SWEET) and comfort myself by looking at porn.  Because I always have energy for smut.  Procrastination is one of my overwhelming problems, but I'm trying to bear in mind that I have actually made progress, just not very much and not very quickly. But like I said, one fucking step forward . . . .

Guys I would not put off: 

I'm digging that wallpaper

Get in the car, loser.

What a sweet boy.

Hot tubs with that much foam in them are a bad sign.  Too much DNA running loose in there.

A naked, humpy reader.  What could be more appealing?

This picture confuses me, he's washing next to a scaffold, amidst a rock garden?  Not that that would stop me, but still, what?

That kind of oar is called a scull and I think using them looks so elegant.  Especially if you have an ass like that.

Speaking of asses.

Nick Tyler, in all his meatiness.

And speaking of meatiness.

In Which We Dabble in Art

Were you the one in the gimp suit?

 When Super Agent Fred died in back in September, I inherited, along with Toby, the world's sweetest cat, all of Fred's artwork.  Our friends and Fred's family took everything they wanted (I announced at the funeral no one would be allowed to leave without taking something.  I was fully prepared to turn the whole thing into a hostage situation) but even so, there was still quite a bit left.  My plan is to set up a website and advertise it as free art on Craigslist and see what happens. I'm trying not to use the phrases "unload" or "get rid of" but my delicate sensibilities will only go so far and I would really like to share some with the wider world and out of my guest room.

I had initially thought I would photograph each piece for the site, but after almost 4 months of doing exactly Jack shit, I contracted with a photographer to come in and shoot them for me.  So he was here this afternoon and managed in a little more than 2 hours to accomplish more than I was able to in 13 weeks.

He was very pleasant and very capable and I was glad of it. The schedule is that I will get the pictures back from him next week.  I've already set up the site and will try to overcome the slacker inertia which is such a charming part of my personality so that I can load all the pictures up there.  I will keep you naughty pusses abreast of developments.

He also came fully equipped with the affordable perfume so beloved by tradesman everywhere.  When I owned my own home and had to deal with the maintenance there, I got to be so familiar with it, I came to think of it as eau d' plumber.  I don't understand why any guy who comes to work on your place is guaranteed to arrive a few seconds behind a cloud of cologne.  And not just any cologne, but one with a sharp pungency which drills through my nose into my sinuses and from there into my skull. 

Both of the cats demonstrated their individual personalities when confronted with the photographer's invasion of their space.  Toby was friendly and wanted pets and demanded to be allowed in the room where he was shooting just so he could keep an eye on things.  Octavia was initially sort of skittish, but then decided she couldn't be bothered and went back to bed. 

I'm looking forward to organizing the Super Agent Fred Memorial Free Art Giveaway.  Initially when I was wrestling all of the pieces into my guest room, I thought there was about 50 or 60 of them.  Today, it turned out there are, in fact, more than 200.  So there's plenty to go around, no pushing please.  But nobody is getting out of here without at least one. 

Guys who are works of art:

I just love these bigguns.

I don't know how much work he has expended on thoser abs, but t was all worth it.

Get in loser, we're going to the mall.

In the studio

Plop

Don't think about summer being over, think about it coming now that we've passed the solstice.

Chiaroscuro

Nice calves.

In Which We Clean House

 

I have spent the last week organizing and cleaning out super agent Fred's apartment.  Considering it is only a studio, there certainly was a lot of crap to get through.  A huge chunk was Fred's art supplies. Photographic evidence supplied:

 

I had discovered a recycling place here in town that would take art supplies.  They had very clear standards about what they would take, but they would even come and haul them off IF you packed them up in specific boxes and there had to be at least six boxes.  No problem hitting the minimum box.  Photographic evidence applied: 

I spent all day packing paints and brushes and who knows what.  Artist esoterica, that's what.  Then I went to the recycler's website to arrange for them to come schlep it all off only to be met by a notice there saying they were taking a break from donations.  As you can see in the picture above, the windows were all blocked with the flotsam and jetsam I have been dealing with which was fortunate because otherwise I would have thrown myself out one.

I lay in bed that evening crippled and concerned the cats would figure out I was too weak to fend them off and they would eat me, all the while trying to conceive a plan that would allow me to unload nine very heavy boxes of art supplies.  That's when I remembered my old friend Craigslist.  When I sold my house, I put a listing on there announcing free crap and there was a line out the door on the day of the crap fest.  Following that plot, I posted a listing for Fred's stuff and within 12 hours I had agreed to meet some guy over there who was the lucky winner of all the equipment a budding artist could want. 

I also now have more than 200 responses in my email from Craigslist aficionados, but first come,  first serve.  Also, two things that made me glad I went with the first guy.  He was not only interested in the art stuff, but willing to take all sorts of other random junk I was trying to get rid of.  Yay.  And he was really cute in a classically California surfer boys sort of way.  Photographic evidence supplied: 

Anyway.  Everyday when I go over to the apartment and work and work, I think "Oh thank God, I'm almost through." And then the next time I come back whatever progress I made seems to have evaporated and I am confronted with a mountain of Fredtastic debris.  But after today, thanks to the Craigslist cutie, I think I am pretty much finished.  Photographic evidence supplied: 

Before

After

Cute guys who may or may not be on Craigslist:

You know how fond I am of gingers.

The terror of the locker room, hopefully.

Ready to rumble.

Honestly, I'm too tired to come up with captions for nekkid guys.

The old peekaboo pose.

In Which We Can Host

 

Secret agent Fred's apartment building is doing some work on his place so he and his terribly sweet cat, Toby, have decamped over here. It's always a pleasure being able to hang out with Fred and it's very amusing to have a kitty back in the place.

This week's special guest star, Toby.

Fred has had a very rough year, his cancer keeps hanging around like an unwelcome guest, chemo and radiation were both an important part of his schedule, he wound up with anemia and was so beaten down by it all that he was one of the few people I know who spend more time in bed than I do.

At the end of the summer though, he suddenly bounced back, energetic and in good mood and interested in hanging out with us.  It was an enormous relief; this time last year, I was very worried that we would be looking at a fredless future quite soon.

So I have been really enjoying having my old friend back and when he wanted to spend some time up, I was all for it.  We had a very amusing couple of days and went out to dinner, things are going great.  Until they weren't.  On the way home from the restaurant, Fred sort of collapsed and wound up puking all over the sidewalk and staggering back to the apartment.  I thought I would have to carry him and wondered if instead I should just call for an ambulance.  The whole gastrointestinal storm blew up in just a moment, but had real lasting power.

The poor old thing spent all day in bed yesterday and most of today.  My nursing prowess tends towards asking "how are you feeling?" over and over as if I could harang the patient into feeling better.  I try to imply that they are letting me down by not recuperating fast enough.  Knowing that that is, oddly enough, not helpful, I restrain myself instead and just ask what they need and occasionally offer aspirin or tea or ginger ale or plain rice.  Late this afternoon, Fred got up and accepted my rice idea and is now ensconced on the living room couch.

Having gone through these peaks and valleys several times with R Man, I know there's really not much for those of us on the sidelines to do other than just hold on and hope for the best.  When you're sick there's just not a lot anyone can do for you.  Anyway, at the moment Fred is doing better so I'm just going to enjoy a dinner of rice with him.

Guys:

I love big ol' hardons that just pop out.

The most popular guy on the work site.

Daniel Osgood.  Cause sometimes you just want to be pretty.

A new favorite of ours here at mrpeenee, inc., Juan Hortoneda.

 A peek o' cheek.

Paride Spaziano, the beautiful.

My Halloween post included a bunch of cop love pictures, this is just a leftover.

I forget this guy's name.  Sorry.