blogs and popes

I had a deadline last Friday so I sat down and created this blog. (I have one today so I'm writing the post.) Within the week, An old friend sent me her new blog URL and Delphine Fawundu-Buford, a photographer whose work I love but whom I don't know also sent me hers (they're both linked off the main blog page; Delphine's got portfolios of her images linked from hers, so check it out). You know, I thought blogs were passé and I was late to the game but apparently not. This is exciting! In the 6 years that I've had my website fewer artists have created their own web pages than I thought would, though many have. But this is a great new twist. There is something really wonderful and direct and interactive about this format—maybe it's more inviting than a website. There's less formatting to be done—everything fits into a template. Clearly there's this whole world of photoblogs (http://photoblogs.org/) out there of which I was completely ignorant.

Timing is everything. The election this past week of a former Hitler youth movement member (atoned, my ass) as Pope, the same week that the gruesome Ann Coulter is hailed on the cover of Time magazine, and even one of my favorite trashy gossip pages (http://pagesixsixsix.com/modules/news/) reports that some Christian website refused a prayer for Britney Spears because they don't like her morals, have all come together to finally give me some small glimmer of hope for the future. Conservatives get more absurd, outlandish, and ridiculous each day. Could we take any more giant steps backward? For the first time since November I'm thinking if they don't kill us all first (a distinct possibility) they just might collapse from the weight of all their absurd evil. Last week in Santa Fe I followed a guy until he parked so I could compliment him on his bumpersticker, which read:

Got Religion?
Please keep it to yourself.