i ordered (as noted previously) a new print — One Rose II, by Heleen Vriesendorp — and, naturally, it was delivered while I was at LISA.
Anyways, I went out to brunch with Sean today, at Orange in printers row, and that was pretty good. I had the pancake flight, which was four different types of silver dollar pancakes — this week’s theme ingredient was pineapple — and after that, we went for a ride in my car, because they’re borrowing it this weekend, and it’s been awhile since Sean’s driven a stick shift. So that after that, we went upstairs and Sean helped me hang the new print. actually, Sean hung the print, I pretty much just watched. I’m very pleased with it. I like pretty flowers. I like paintings. So I like pretty paintings of pretty flowers as well. Interestingly, Sean and I both had the same impression of the painting, which shocked the hell out of me when he mentioned it, apropos nothing. for some reason, the painting just reminds me a lot of the Dark Tower books. of course, the rose is integral to the story, but the print’s rose is blue, and in the books the rose is red. But that’s just aesthetics. There’s some sort of sense in the painting, reminiscent of the scenery in the books. Something of the juxtaposition — and can I just say how shocked I am that this dictation software can recognize the word “juxtaposition” but can’t get “red,” and writes “Brad” instead? Sigh. — between the frankly ugly landscape, and the often frankly ugly interactions between characters and locations, and this one perfect rose. To say much more than that, if you have not read the story, would probably spoil things, so I won’t go on. if you have read the story, you’ll know what I’m talking about; if you haven’t read it, then you really really should. Even if you don’t really like Stephen King all that much, it’s not really traditional Stephen King as far as horror goes — it’s mostly just a fantastic story (in terms of fantasy, not a value judgement) that involves everything from romance and guns, post-nuclear apocalyptic civilization, and bizarre family politics to enormously disconcerting locations and imagery, and more. I could keep going on — it is, after all, probably my favorite book series of all time — but I won’t, because again, if you’ve read the book, you know what I’m talking about; and if you haven’t, you should. anyways, given the obvious differences between the print rose, and the book rose, I’m really surprised that Sean had the same impression that I did — namely that the painting is reminiscent of the book. That’s really all. I guess this wasn’t a very interesting blog entry.