Round Museum

You can probably guess that this machine is carrying those balls up to somewhere for something. We're not sure what, yet. In classic Rube Goldberg style, there is a lot of activity and we're waiting for the payoff. Maybe once the balls fall into the tube and roll down the slide and knock over the pins which trigger the lever that flips the spinner then the lights will be turned off or the bread will get buttered.

10.11.20

This electrified contraption keeps the light on in the restaurant bathroom. That is, until you flush the toilet. Then the hoop falls, the sphere swings out in a wide parabola on the twisted wire while you wash your hands, and then hits the button on the air dryer just in time for you to dry them underneath, blowing the line of toilet roll tubes over, which activates the spring-loaded winch, that lifts the doorstop on a rope and turns the doorknob to open the door for you. It's the newest Rube Goldberg automated bathroom attendant service.

10.10.20

You can look, but be advised that touching is at your own risk. Cacti developed needles as a way to provide shade from the desert sun like mini-umbrella clusters, and to protect from animals that may want to eat them. When you're re-potting them be sure to handle with thick gardening gloves or newspaper. You don't want some accidental glochidia acupuncture to ruin your afternoon.

10.09.20

"I was very Hungry; it was so late." It’s pasta night. Water. Olive oil. Salt. Now we're just Waiting. Poor Richard has said "a watched pot is slow to boil." But when it does, the pasta goes in for 10 minutes, right?

10.08.20

Look closely at the Round. Step back and squint a little. Let your brain do the work. Someone is there looking back at you. That conglomeration of little dots is called a halftone, an optical illusion where the pattern forms a flat tone or an image depending on how you look at it. Your eye and your brain interprets the gaps between and makes the connections. You see that Einstein?

Fleet Science Center
San Diego, CA

10.07.20

With an ogive nosecone and attachment screw on the tip, a long, cylindrical shape with aluminum and steel skin, and tail fins extending below propellant tanks, you may not be surprised that this liquid-fuel flying object was first launched in Roswell, New Mexico. However, no flying saucers were involved. Robert H. Goddard tested this A-series rocket at the now-legendary site for Charles Lindbergh and Harry Guggenheim back in 1935. The aliens would crash there 12 years later.

Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum
Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center
Chantilly, VA

A screw, a washer, and a few decades of paint and rust present a problem. If you're going to get a screw loose, you've got to twist and turn with some elbow grease, give it a soak with lubricant, or tap it with a hammer. But the moment of force is upon you.

10.05.20

All signs are pointing up. Soon it will be cocktail hour. There’s vodka on the rocks. And the watermelon is freshly cut. Cheers!

10.03.20

The early autumn surf has delivered a bloom of Round glass-like disks glinting in the late afternoon sun along the shoreline. With an interesting spotted radial pattern and faint four leaf clover in the middle, the Aurelia aurita -- or moon jellyfish -- is a common sight on Long Beach Island, New Jersey. Floating along with the currents and tides to feed on plankton, the jellies have limited control of their own movement, propelling themselves only in one direction by manipulating their body shape, and frequently getting washed ashore in groups. Poor jelly.

10.01.20

I love the outdoors, being active and staying fit. My friends describe me as a passionate soul with a goofy sense of humor and a propensity to eat crickets and flies. I'm a ginger with a slimy Round body. Warts? Spots? Bulging eyes? I've got it all. I own my own lily pad. I love my mother. I'm a nocturnal creature of habit who enjoys singing, playing banjo, and listening to hip-hop. I don't believe in croaking on first dates. But enough about me, I'd like to get to know you. Message me?

09.30.20