snarfd

Man Discovers Creepiest Clown Painting of All Time

2008-09-29T21:00:33Z

A Memphis man accidentally discovers the creepiest clown painting of all time in his doctor’s examination room. And clown art may never be the same.

When Peter Baskind entered his doctor’s examination room for a routine procedure, he never expected to make a discovery which would forever redefine creepy clown art. But a renowned expert in the field says the unique image will have critics talking for years to come.

A uniquely creepy discovery

“I didn’t notice it at first,” said Baskind. “Really, I was just worried about getting that little paper gown on before someone walked in. But then I turned and saw it, right above the sink. And I knew I was seeing something very special.”

The creepy clown painting — printed on glossy paper stock and mounted in an antiqued gold frame — features a rare “couples” image of two sad clowns sharing a poignant moment together. A young (and almost certainly underage) female harlequin is being comforted by a classically creepy tramp clown.

International importance

Enhanced detail: Creepiness, Old World and New

“That’s what’s really startling about this creepy clown painting,” explains Dr. Ernst “Boffo” Haeckel, Dean of Clown Art at the University of Memphis. “You have in the left foreground the quintessential American creepy clown, a dirty hobo of the Emmet Kelly school. He’s tenderly wiping away the tears of a harlequin, the finest example of European creepy clownery. This single painting unifies a centuries-old continuum of both Old and New World creepiness.”

Haeckel is recognized as an expert in his field, and his seminal Tears on Velvet remains the standard exposition of creepy clown art some thirty years after its first publication.

“I could never have anticipated a clown painting of such sublime creepiness to remain unnoticed so long,” Haeckel told snarfd in a telephone interview. “The circumstances of its display only enhance its creepiness — the harsh fluorescent lighting; the white metal institutional dispenser nearby; and the fact that it is located in a room associated with fear and physical discomfort. I’m humbled this is in my own city.”

A new cultural landmark?

When snarfd asked Baskind if he intended to return to the scene of his discovery, he was quick to reveal his eagerness.

“I really want to bring the kids,” answered Baskind. “Of course, my doctor is a urologist, so I’ll have to find some sort of a pretext. But this creepy clown picture is just the sort of thing you feel compelled to share with those you love the most.”

More Reading:

Unsurprising Study: Kids Are Scared of Clowns (snarfd)

Signs of Faith: Roadside Spirituality

2008-08-18T15:05:04Z

In the Deep South, professions of faith are as often found by the side of the road as a church pew. Here are a few of our faves, spotted by snarfd’s photographers.

First Wesleyan Church: Warrington, Florida

Church Bus: Mobile, Alabama

Unwelcoming Pawn Shop: Lucedale, Mississippi

Seen a great church sign? Tip us! Use the Contact link and we’ll share your image with other snarfers.

Strange Alternative Power Source: Expired Medications

2008-08-03T09:25:44Z

Imagine this sticker above your light switch: Powered by Prozac.

No, it’s not likely that your local power plant will be swapping coal for old Celebrex tablets anytime soon. But a little free energy is the happy byproduct of drug disposal by Milwaukee-based Capital Returns, a company that specializes in the management of old pharmaceutical stocks.

Drugs have shelf life, beyond which they cannot be sold. But old medications are more difficult to get rid of than you might think. Drugs which get sent to landfills will eventually leech their way into the groundwater. Flushing old stock — the method generally recommended to consumers — puts chemicals into our watershed even faster.

Drug-Filled Rivers

And that’s a problem. Ignored for years, pharmaceutical water pollution is finally getting the attention of U.S. and European scientists as unexpectedly high levels of antibiotics, heart medication, anticonvulsive drugs, and a host of other powerful medications are turning up in rivers and groundwater. Perhaps the most disturbing pollutants are endocrine disruptors: human estrogen from birth-control pills and the vast effluence of animal hormones produced by commercial livestock production.

The effects of these substances on wildlife — and the human food chain — are just now being studied. But they’re likely to reveal bewildering mutations similar to the dual-sexed smallmouth bass turning up in the Potomac River north of Washington, DC.

Most pharmaceutical pollution makes its way to our watershed through the release of treated sewage. But controlled industrial incineration prevents old drug stocks from adding to the problem, and is being harnessed by Capital Returns to produce surplus power.

A Prescription for Free Power

Every day, the company receives millions of expired pharmaceuticals from drug manufacturers, cataloging their receipt and routing them for hazardous disposal or to Covanta Energy, a company which specializes in converting waste into energy. Covanta currently operates thirty facilities in the United States, offering communities an alternative to landfill dumping in the disposal of such things as municipal solid waste and household trash. Their incinerators exceed EPA regulations for air purity.

And now, expired drugs. Capital Returns disposed of over 6.5 million pounds of pills in 2006 — producing enough energy to power about 220 homes for a year. That’s tons of coal or natural gas saved and fewer pollutants making their way into the water table.

Next Stop: Your Corner Drug Store

Capital Returns says it handles about a quarter of the industry’s disposal needs. But they don’t address expired drugs already in the hands of consumers. Washington State is among the first to set up pilot programs to test the viability of public drop-off centers. Emma Johnson, who works for the state’s Department of Ecology, says a five county area has been experimenting with pharmacy-based drug collection centers since last October. If successful, the effort will be expanded statewide.

Converting drugs to power is, admittedly, a footnote to emerging story of 21st century alternative power solutions. But it illustrates the larger strategy of closing the loop on consumer goods, keeping dangerous wastes out of the environment while converting them into something useful.

Turning Everest’s Trash Into Art

2008-08-04T06:42:42Z

To climb Everest is to climb to the moon. At 29,028 feet (8,848 meters), the summit of the world’s highest point is no less inhospitable than outer space.

If you want to get there, you’ll need to be well-equipped: tents, medical equipment, food, stoves, miles of rope, ladders, pitons, hammers, ice axes, and dozens of oxygen tanks. A good-sized expedition might bring tons of supplies to the foot of the mountain.

That’s the way it had been since 1924, when Englishmen George Mallory and Andrew Irvine made the first organized attempt to reach Everest’s summit. They never returned — but other climbers came. At last report, over 2,200 adventurers had made it to the top. And they left a lot of garbage along the way.

Trash at the top of the world

Conditions are so difficult on the mountain that it’s tempting for climbers to simply dump their used gear than carry it down. This was common practice until the Eighties, when the government of Nepal, alarmed at the pollution of a mountain many consider holy, began requiring expeditions to demonstrate they’d brought back everything taken up Everest’s mighty incline.

Since then, things have improved. Japanese climbers, in particular, took Everest’s trashy condition to heart, mounting expeditions for the purpose of cleaning-up the main ascent routes. But at the base of the mountain and in the poor Sherpa villages which surround it, you’ll still see piles of collected gear. And that’s where we meet eco-artist Jeff Clapp.

In 2004, Clapp traveled to Nepal to see if he could secure some of the salvaged oxygen tanks for his workshop in the United States. He knew that beneath their expedition stickers and oxidized paint lay gleaming aircraft-grade aluminum and the potential for something truly beautiful. $7000 USD later (and almost as much in shipping fees), Clapp was the owner of 132 slightly worn, lovingly used climbing cylinders.

Garbage that glitters

Back home in Maine, Clapp set about turning Everest’s garbage into strikingly individual pieces of art. The top sections of the tanks became marvelous bells: elegant, full-throated, and accented with traditional Nepalese designs and native wood. Clapp fashioned the tank bottoms into gleaming bowls, similar to the singing bowls used in the liturgy of the hundreds of Buddhist temples and monasteries which dot the Himalayas.

Clapp’s work doesn’t come cheap: his creations are featured in some of the United State’s best art galleries. But for many, touching Clapp’s work is an immediate connection to the rare and forbidding beauty of Mt. Everest. And some say that in the sound of the bells, you can hear the voice of the mountain.

Snarfd caught up with Clapp a few weeks ago to ask about his work, and how it came to be that he began turning Everest’s trash into treasure.

Snarfd: Jeff, thanks for agreeing to field a few questions. First things first: whatever gave you the idea of going to Everest to find materials for your work?

Jeff Clapp: I made a bell years ago out of a carbon dioxide cylinder from a restaurant — the kind they use them to put bubbles in soda. It made a good bell, but it didn’t have any life. I went back to woodturning. A long time later, I was watching a National Geographic special about Everest. Seeing all those cylinders on the top of the world set a light off in my head. I knew I could make something from those them.

Snarfd: The bells are beautiful. How do you make them? It looks as if they’re milled in some way.

Jeff Clapp: I turn the bells on a fantastic Oneway wood lathe. I use standard woodturning tools to slowly cut away the metal to reveal beads, coves, and grooves. I use a specially designed water jet to cut holes in the bells to change the pitch, tone, and resonance. Then I either install a hook to hang the bell or design a marble or burl base for a sculptural bell.

Snarfd: A lot of the mountain climbing groups say they’ve gone out of their way not just to bring their own stuff down the mountain, but to pick up the trash left by past expeditions. How were things when you visited?

Jeff Clapp: The valley was very clean when I was there. I trekked into Namche Bazaar at 12,000 feet and found the particular cylinders I was searching for had been recovered by the Nepal Mountaineering Association in 2002. The Sherpa told me that most of the oxygen tanks were gone and had been taken to somewhere in Katmandu. These days, there’s a trash fee for climbing Everest. If you don’t come out with as much metal, paper, and plastic as took in they keep your $4000 deposit. It makes people pick-up trash on the way out to make sure they get the deposit back.

Snarfd: You’ve said you’re hoping to return to Nepal at some point. You’re not looking for more cylinders, are you?

Jeff Clapp: No, I decided early on that the ones I recovered would be enough for me. I don’t want to stop other from copying my work because I don’t want to stop others from cleaning up the trash from Everest. By returning the concept of using the cylinders for art to the Nepalese the whole project comes full circle. I have always wanted this project to help everyone who participated. The Nepalese are fine artisans — I would not be surprised to find they’re already making bells. But I have been looking for sponsorship to send me back with lathes and cutters to create a contingent of artists who can make more bells and finish the clean-up.

Snarfd: This project seems to have taken on a spiritual element for you. How has going to Nepal and coming back to translate your experience into art changed you?

Jeff Clapp: For me, it has been an evolving journey. I have found meaning in small thing that happened along this journey that lead me to very positive thing that have happened in my life. My daughter — who was in the third grade at the time — brought home a weekly reader flyer a month before my flight to Nepal. It was a two page science paper about Mt. Everest and the trash left there. It showed a climber coming down through the kumbu with a back-load of salvage from the mountain. In the next image, the same Sherpa was kneeling next to a pile of cylinders. Long story short, I ended up finding that exact pile and buying them.

Before beginning his work on the bells, Jeff Clapp was well-known as a skilled woodworking artisan. He continues to transform Everest’s trash into art at his Maine studios. His work is on display around the country, and at his website, Bells from Everest. This article originally appeared on our sister site, Lighter Footstep.

Miracle! Apparition of Robert Scoble in Grilled Cheese

2008-08-03T09:40:28Z

Dear snarfd,

I was making a grilled cheese sandwich this evening for my son, Jefferson, who’s always so hungry after Little League practice. So I serve him up and he says, “Momma! Look at my sandwich!” I ran over and it was like he seen a ghost. And there — plain as can be, I can’t believe I didn’t see it before — was a FACE on the cheese sandwich!

Here’s the weird part. Jefferson says he’s seen the face before. He says it’s some blogger named Robert Scoble. I don’t read blogs except for snarfd and Perez Hilton, so I don’t know. But I’m sending you a picture of it.

Jefferson says Robert Scoble tasted real fine with ketchup.

Sincerely,

Tracy S.
Tupelo, Mississippi

Why Banner Ads on Photo Popups Aren’t a Good Idea

2008-06-24T22:47:40Z

Fatal car wreck photo popup: Pensacola News Journal. Some advertising rep is going to get a phone call.

New John McCain Campaign Store Features Plush Golf Gifts, Unmoderated Product Reviews

2008-06-24T21:47:24Z

Republican presumptive presidential nominee John McCain often casts himself as a maverick, breaking with the policies of both parties as the conductor of his Straight Talk Express.

Now the Arizona senator has broken with the Bush Administration on a matter of national policy: playing golf.

You might remember that President Bush recently revealed that he’s set aside his love of the links out of respect for the families of soldiers killed and wounded in Iraq. It turns out this really isn’t the case: the President laid off his game after a knee injury, and has been photographed playing golf since his supposedly gave up his game. But it’s the thought that counts.

Now along comes John McCain, who apparently has no qualms about getting in a few quick holes between campaign engagements. The front page of his website, in fact, features a front page ad for McCain branded golf gear. It’s given the same front-and-center attention as campaign strategy, voter decision-making, and the general election:

Yes: When the going gets tough, the tough go golfing. And what Republican campaign supporter wouldn’t feel secure zipping their balls behind the proud McCain brand?

There’s one minor problem for the online McCain store. It turns out that product reviews are — as if this article’s writing — entirely unmoderated. All one needs to do is sign up as potential customer to rate a product. And it hasn’t taken long for a few waggish golf fans to weigh in with their opinions of McCain golf gear:

No need to squint. You can read the growing collection of McCain Golf Pack customer reviews at the McCain Store. For the moment, at least.

Finnish Stockboys Turn Market into a Giant Domino Train

2008-08-02T23:32:39Z

Ever wonder what those stockboys are doing when your favorite store is closed?

At grocery in Finland, they’re playing dominoes — on an impressive scale. Marvel as this fully 6 minute long train of shipping palettes, plastic baskets, cases of drinks, and cereal boxes works its way up from the basement and through the aisles of an “undisclosed” Finnish market.

Link: YouTube (Thanks, Jari!)

Coolest Old Guy o’ the Month: 93 Year Old Frank Milo Busted in Sex Sting

2008-08-03T00:30:54Z

You know, I kind of hope that I get caught in a sex sting when I’m 93 years old.

Tampa Bay Online has it:

MANATEE COUNTY – Prosecutors are moving ahead with a case against one of two 93-year-old men picked up during undercover prostitution stings.

In the case of Frank Milio, prosecutors have issued subpoenas and plan to take him to trial in April.

Milio, according to police records, tried to pay $20 in November to an undercover officer on 14th Street West.

Milio recently told the Herald-Tribune he was only flirting with the woman.

“I haven’t had that in years,” he said. “Ninety-three is kind of old.”

Carlos Underhill, 93, will not be charged, although he does not deny stopping to chat with the “good-looking girl” who made eyes at him and turned out to be an undercover officer.

Police say Underhill was willing to pay $30 for sex and that he promised to come back a few hours later to consummate the deal.

I bet he had to come back a few hours after paying so his Vitamin V could kick in. I feel bad he got caught, I hope his luck is better next time.

Link [Tampa Bay Online]

81 Year Old Man Builds Robot To Shoot Him In the Head in His Driveway

2008-08-03T00:33:08Z

81 Year old Francis Tovey allegedly built a special suicide robot. It was programmed to fire multiple shots from a .22 semi-automatic pistol. The robot fired into Mr. Torvey’s head in his driveway; he is reported to have chosen the driveway because he knew workmen next door would quickly find his body.

I don’t know, but it sounds kinda dodgy to me. How do we know we’re not dealing with an ultra sophisticated killer robot from the future here? It could be disguised to look like something built with a jigsaw power tool. I wouldn’t wan to work at the police evident room- you know that thing is going to break out in a violent orgy of mayhem.

Link [Times Online]

Photo credit: Flickr user Jurvetson