The rain kept up, falling along Harajuku, beading on her plastic jacket, the children of Tokyo trooping past the famous boutiques in white loafers and clingwrap capes, until she’d stood with him in the midnight clatter of a pachinko parlor and held his hand like a child.

The only other William Gibson novel I’ve read is Pattern Recognition, and at the time I was expecting something more along the lines of Bradbury, so Gibson just came off as a giant techno-nerd writing a thriller. He strings together a ton of adjectives to create a scene, but the flow of the words gets lost admidst under their weight. However, what was redeeming was how well he had his pulse on San Francisco, or how a segment of SF has followed the fashion in his book with the military surplus wear and black tanks. And Cayce’s allergic reaction towards Tommy Hilfiger was great and very on point.

Reading Neuromancer for the first time, I’m seeing these parallels with San Francisco once more. The book is again (justifiably) laden with technobabble, but tech is an undeniable undercurrent of this city. Gibson should be required SF reading, along with the Beats.

Also, been craving to go back to Tokyo as of late.

“And I always feel that a man and a woman who do not like the same films, will eventually divorce.” — Jean-Luc Godard

(Source: olivier-serrano)

“The problems of our entire society are of a sexual nature.” -Dr. Lawrence Jacoby

(Source: allpeakseverything)

Ernst Haas. New York Reflection, 1952.

Bored with obvious reality, I find my fascination in transforming it into a subjective point of view. Without touching my subject I want to come to the moment when, through pure concentration of seeing, the composed picture becomes more made than taken. Without a descriptive caption to justify its existence, it will speak for itself – less descriptive, more creative; less informative, more suggestive; less prose, more poetry.

— Ernst Haas from ‘About Color Photography’, in DU, 1961

This is why I dislike Instagram, Facebook, and also Hipstamatic.  Take better photos or make the effort to actually shoot some film.  Authenticity and “being real” should be more than a slogan.

“Just as Instagram makes bad photos look good and good photos look great, Facebook makes you look happy and loved if you’re not, and joyous and adored if you are. Self-brand and share. Filter, and share. Share the edited stuff, the varnished stuff, the stuff with the halo around it. Take a step away from truth for the sake of beauty.”

— Dan Zak, in a day-after essay on how Facebook and Instagram were meant for each other. (via washingtonpoststyle)