The Chagall exhibit at SF MOMA gets a big thumbs up. I'd only been vaguely acquainted with Chagall's work before going to the show. The show made it clear that I've been missing out. There are many many stunning paintings in that show: beautiful, colorful, whimsical, strange paintings. Good stuff. Go see it, if you can.

Skip the audio program, though. I usually skip them, anyway, but the program was included with the tickets we'd bought. The program managed to do a lot of talking about the paintings without actually telling you much about them. Memo to commentary writers: if you're going to bother to mention the 'deep allegorical significance of X' then you might want to explain what the deep allegorical significance of X is.

Of course, I'll admit that sometimes I'm just dense. I was completely befuddled by the commentary's offhand reference to the "obvious Freudian overtones" of this picture. A couple of hours later, I suddenly announced, "Oh, I get it - it's a painting of a giant cock!"

Ahem. Just can't take me anywhere.

Anyway, I think that looking at art must be good for me creatively, because Friday morning while I was getting ready to go to work, I worked out the plot of a sweet little short story. I wrote the first five pages over dinner and coffee Friday night after work, and finished up the remaining ten pages today (mostly while hiding out from the heat in the Berkeley public library, which, unlike my apartment, has air conditioning.) My plan is type it into the computer tonight/tommorow, and send it off to the crit group just in time to meet the story submission deadline for next week's meeting.

The story is really an attempt to do a Chagall painting in prose. We'll see how it works.

It's been some time since I've written anything that came that quickly and easily. I think it's a function of length really - the more complex a piece is, the less likely it is to spring fully-formed out of my head. It's fun when it happens.

Not much else to report. As I said, it was beastly hot today, and Daniel and I spent most of the afternoon in the Berkeley public library.

It's still pretty beastly hot. I think I'm going to go watch some more Neverwhere.