Oooooh Baby Baby

UFO hunting in Tucson

The woman who published a small libertarian newspaper asked me, “Do you want to come UFO hunting with us tonight?” This would be a first for me, so I gamely accepted her invitation.

With my Pentax and tripod in tow, we picked up the others, bought a case of beer, and headed twenty miles NW of Tucson to a spot near the former Titan missile silo complex.

I quickly learned the art of UFO hunting. Drink some beer, erect tripod and camera, open up the aperture all the way, set on time exposure, and wait.......and wait.........and wait. Bats darted about, picking off small insects with the efficiency of a Hoover. There was a little conversation among us, but not so much as to ruin the effect of our mission--to locate and photograph aliens.

On the way to the location, the woman told me that her boyfriend was a hybrid, half human and half alien. She referred to him as a Visitor. I was happy she left him at home that night, and didn't bother to ask which parent was the alien, though I hoped it was the father.

I downed my fourth beer quickly, and looked to the Southwest. A blinking light above the horizon caught my eye. I alerted the others to it. It must be a plane, I thought, but it wasn't very high in the sky and the light was too irregular for a beacon. I stared hard and got behind my camera's 300 mm telephoto lens. A thin dark outline broke the arc of the sky 20 degrees behind the light. It was the edge of a mountain range, and the blinking light was a car traversing a tree-lined mountain road.

The aliens were probably two college students looking for a secluded spot.

Tombstone Arizona is InWorld and out of this world

Tombstone AZ in Second Life. StevieG in foreground wearing suspenders

During my college days, I wrote news and feature articles for the local edition of the Tombstone Epitaph. The newspaper made the University of Arizona Journalism department one of the best in the country--we wrote and designed a paper for a real town with permanent residents. And Tombstone's storied history provided added cache that drew visitors from all over the world.

Dinosaur bones, nearby ghost towns, local beauty pageants, and contemporary town power brokers provided a wide palette for reporters. Today you can follow the goings-on in Tombstone at the online version of the Epitaph, still published by the U of A Journalism department.

Inspired by Casey Olbermann's Epitaph article (Culture Section), "Many travel to Tombstone's virtual world," I recently went through the preliminaries (see above graphic) to enter the virtual world of Tombstone Arizona on Second Life. I will post my experiences there from time to time. SG

In search of the best pork in outer space

"Curious that the captain would not accept my reasoning for going beyond Sigma Draconis 6 for pork bellies. When it comes to the searing effect of radiation on porcine specimens, an outer planet of a red giant star system is far inferior to an inner world of a white dwarf sun." SG

Go story and poem

Graphic art from Go World magazine, No. 81

Chinese legends abound of people who had chance meetings in the mountains with immortals. The legend of Wang Chih, a woodcutter, has survived the ages.

From Go World magazine, No. 69, Kiseido Pubishing

Wang Chih was a hardy young fellow who used to venture deep into the mountains to find suitable wood for his axe. One day he went farther than usual and became lost. He wandered for a while and eventually came upon two strange old men who were playing go, their board resting on a rock between them. Wang Chih was fascinated. He put down his axe and began to watch. One of the players gave him something like a date to chew on, so that he felt neither hunger nor thirst. As he continued to watch he fell into a sort of trance for what seemed like an hour or two. When he awoke, however, the two old men were no longer there. He found that his axe handle had rotted to dust and he had grown a long beard. When he got back to his native village he discovered that his family had disappeared and that no one even remembered his name.

Inspired by the legend, Ki no Tomonori, a Japanese poet and court official, returned to his home capital from a distant land circa A.D. 900 and wrote:

I've come back home/
There is no friend to play go with/
That place far away/
where an axe handle turned to dust--/
how dear to me it has become!

Dim relieve

“Quite accidentally, I found a limitless source of inspiring imagery and infinite expression: women. When I was a little girl, I used to watch my grandmother who was a fashion designer, work with women. She was a visionary; a very talented lady. Sadly, because of many circumstances during those times – most notably the war and communism in the Czech Republic – she never fulfilled her dream. I knew from a very young age, I would become an artist to make my grandmother’s dreams and mine, a reality. Through my work, I aspire to bring our visions, feelings, thoughts and inspirations to life. It is so rewarding for me to be able to share my emotions and energy with you. Thank you for reading and exploring with me.”

--Misa Verbeek

Far from you

Misa Verbeek has a current exhibit at Cafeneo in Lincoln Square, Chicago IL