Holiday Cheer As My Arrival Date Draws Near

Anxiousness coupled with insomnia equals late nights and eventually crashing in the early morning hours around 4am these days... uncertainty about my preparation for the rapidly approaching overseas venture fills me with perpetual anxiety.  This has been the pattern over the last many nights.  Watching movies until the wee hours of the morning gives me back pains from the recliner.  My posture:  impotent and sloven as I munch on chips and dip and pickles sweet and sandwich dills, green olives stuffed with garlic and jalepenos and slices of block cheddar while my vision blurs from the bright, throbbing plasma TV barking at me in Dolby stereo.

On this night a few beers has allowed me to digress into some crude Photoshop Christmas card making.  Sending these juvenile creations to my friends via the internet has made me happy.  Bill Maher pasted next to Paris Hilton and Tiger Woods with the phrase Merry XXX Mas! at the top and HO! HO! HO! placed under each image complimented my demented mood as I sent it off to many a buddy.  I used the paint tool to write the words in Xmas colors and haphazardly cut out the images of the celebrity sex addicts using the magnetic wand.  Cut and paste, technology, minimalism.  What more do modern day artist's need?  I feel a similar satisfaction with the end result of this 15 minute defecation as I do when I finish a piece after 120 hours or more of labor... my blood and sweat in charcoal.  Instant imagery is all the rage no?  One need not make art by the skilled hand any longer, ability is trumped by accessibility.  Appropriation saves the day with some whimsical negativity... Fine art is dead and so are our idols... true or false?