No manches, güey.

Things are pretty quiet down here. I've been taking classes and... taking classes. Not much to report.

Saturday, I cruised up to el DF for the third time to check out a couple of museums. One was an exhibition of Juan O'Gorman (Mexican-born to an Irish family), whose worked I liked a lot. The colors, man. They were intensely vivid. The stylized nature of his paintings. I don't know why, but I have a severe weakness for Mexican muralists - O'Gorman, Diego Rivera, and others. Don't know why. I still haven't figured out why Frida Kahlo is so insanely popular - however, I have yet to see any of her work in an actual museum. My exposure has just been a slew of artbooks, all of which have yet another set of her self-portraits. I dunno, maybe it's just me, but such blatant egomania isn't really all that appealing (I like the subtle kind). I'll withold a solid judgement until I've gotten some exposure to a more comprehensive collection, but still: bleah.

Note to Kahlomaniacs who might stumble across this page: do not even think about posting some pissy rant in my comments. I don't give a shit. Cabrones.

The second museum was way out to the southeast of the city, beyond the reach of the metro. It had a wide array of lesser-known works from a lot of European artists and a few others. Dali, Rodin, Van Gogh (some tour guide told me I look like Van Gogh; I smirked and showed him that I still have both ears), and more. Lots of religious artwork, which never fails to bore me shitless. Except: there was a lovingly crafted painting of Mary breastfeeding Jesus. Baby Jesus, that is. It was a nice museum and all (except for this one couple that was making out right in front of a painting I wanted to see; pinches mexicanos), but it was a long way from any part of el DF that I knew. I ended up riding a bus for an hour, walking for an hour, and then riding the metro for yet another hour just to get back to the bus station. Naturally, I then rode a bus for almost two hours to get back to Cuernavaca. Ah, well. It's dirt cheap to travel to the City, and I ate some freaking fantastic tacos al pastor. Tacos al pastor = mi vida.

In other news, THE FUCKING WORLD IS FALLING APART. I don't know how much this news is getting to the US, but Mexico is getting brutalized by hurricanes. Guatemala is even worse: entire villages are just gone. Mayors are asking that their towns be declared mass graves because the effort of digging out and then reburying the hundreds of dead is too much for the handful of survivors. And then there's Kashmir (which I'm sure you've heard about). Jesus - like that poor little patch of earth isn't soaked with enough innocent blood. 20,000 dead at the minimum. As many as 40,000. I'm actually grateful that I live in Iowa, where we just have to deal with the occasional tornado. Everywhere else is either getting shredded by hurricanes, shaken to the ground by quakes, or blown up by some overzealous asshole.

Ah, well. At least I'm safe, as are my beloved readers (I hope). I'd like to thank all of you who either introduced yourselves or made fun of my girlfriend last week. Mucho gusto, and/or much obliged.