Seriously, this blogging thing is out of control. Check it out: updates on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, AND Friday of this week? That's almost a full week, according to my sources who know how many days in a week there are. (These sources, however, fail to tell me when something is horribly, horribly not funny. Which is why the joke you just read made it to press.)

The milk I buy around here has a weird name. Every time I go to pick it up, I always question my purchase. "Do I really need milk?" I say to myself. Because it's called Cream-O-Land. Yeah, kind of gross.

I went to the Museum of Modern Art today to check out an exhibition for grad school. More on this in a second. But, afterward, on my way home, I stopped to get some food. I ate in the restaurant and watched people, as I normally do. As I sat there, in downtown Flushing (which is the largest Chinatown I've ever seen), an Asian-looking guy came in. Now, this guy is probably close to my age, maybe a little older. But his distinguishing feature is his hair. It's like a mix of dreadlocks-meets-Marge-Simpson. It's ridiculous. And right there along with him was (who I can only presume to be) his attractive (and normal) looking white girlfriend. What gives? Why's he lucky enough to find a relationship while I, with decidedly average hair, am not? No justice, I tell you. No justice.

So, this MoMA exhibit. It's by a Chinese artist named Song Dong (let's keep the chuckles to a minimum, please). Here's a link with some pictures and a video. It's really an installation piece more than anything. It's a collection of stuff -- clothes, bottles, records, chairs -- that Dong's mother collected over the years. It's based around the Chinese concept of "waste not," which was part of their idea behind survival. So his mother would collect these things and never dispose of them because she never knew when they might end up being useful. Of course, most of these items are, admittedly, junk. It's stuff that you normally wouldn't ever find a use for. But Dong explains in a little mini-essay printed along one of the walls that the exhibit has two purposes. The first is an environmental message: look at the waste we accumulate. That's the easy one to grasp. But the second purpose was a surprise. After Dong's father died in 2002, his mother went through a severe grieving process. So what Dong suggested was that he and his mother sort and inventory all of their possessions. And that's what led to the display in the exhibit. It was a way for his mother to literally and figuratively reconstruct her life. To re-establish herself. To get her life in order. Dong also put a neon message along one of the walls written in Chinese. It translates to: "Dad, don't worry, mum and we are fine."

Maybe it's because my own dad died so close to Dong's. I don't know. But, for whatever reason, after reading that essay, his one piece -- a collection of junk -- evoked in me the most emotional reaction I had my entire time at the museum. None of the other pieces of art in that museum came close to affecting me as strongly. Oh, and the post-script to this is that his mother died just recently -- within the year.

But here's the reason I bring it up. (Finally! A point!) I feel like Dong's installation perfectly represents my view towards fulfilling works of art -- be it a book, movie, TV show, painting, whatever. It requires effort from the viewer. In this case, you have to read. You have to stop and spend fifteen minutes to read. But you're rewarded by learning about this very personal experience. However, other people who don't put in the effort, all they see is a collection of junk.