MUTO

Your imagination deserves the few minutes it takes to watch this short film.

Bookmark it, Dan-o

I've been using these two sites for a few weeks now and I am positive that they're worth sharing. Perhaps you early-adopted long ago. If not, allow me to introduce you to my first new buddy, Pandora. This site allows you to create radio stations with music you like. It's all free. So say you're a huge Fanilow but your evil boss won't let you bring Barry cds to work. Pandora. They also find music that is similar to an artist or song. It helps expand your horizons and shows the Fanilows that Michael Buble is out there crooning as well. You can give songs "thumbs up or down" which helps Pandora learn your taste. It's worth bookmarking immediately.

The second site is StumbleUpon. It literally helps you stumble upon things that interest, amuse, tickle, educate, nourish you. Remember in high school when you'd drive around looking for stuff to do. This is kind of like that. But it has the ability to only take you down the good streets. The streets with hackey-sack games and parks full of rap music and all your friends. You tell Stumble (I call him stu) what interests you and then you start stumbling. You can click that you "liked it" and it saves that site for future reference. It can drive around looking for everything you like or very specific things (video, images, blogs, news). Give it shot and if you find anything cool send it my way. I promise to do the same.

Green Machine

As some of you know I am so green. My lawnmower is still cutting grass sans gas. (that sounds like a sweet rap lyric) And lately I've been thinking that I want a moped. Bad enough that I spent two minutes photoshopping the original Hulk onto a scooter. That has to say something. Anyways, with the gas prices hotstepping towards silliness I just kind of want something I can cruise on but won't kill me. Moped/scooters get like 90 mpg. I'd be so green you'd have to start calling me Lou. Maybe Louie Green. We can iron that out later. The problem is they're selling like hotcakes. Craigslist is failing me. Moped Armies are forming all over. I predict that it won't be long before mopeds and scooters are chirping all over the city. Rideable cicadas.

I always wanted a moped. When I was a kid Dave Losey had one before he was legal. It was black and gold and hardcore. Another friend from junior high, Nate Williams, signed my yearbook on the last day of 7th grade, "this summer, when I get my moped I'll come over so you can ride it." He never got one. I had neighbor who's dad won the lottery and of course he had one. He always told me that once he got a better moped with a bigger engine I could have his old one. That never happened either. I'm just now realizing how many broken teenage promises revolve around mopeds. Weird.

All that to say, if you have a moped or scooter that just sits in your garage let me know. Just don't promise something you can't make good on. I can't handle any more heartbreak.

Soul Food

I doubt I'll ever get political with this weblog. I simply don't know enough to go there intelligently. But, I like how much artists like Obama. Good art speaks to souls. And I'd be willing to say that change only happens if souls are spoken to. Let's all make art this week. My buddy, Hoffmann, smoked a pork shoulder for us this weekend. That was good art. It spoke to my soul and my stomach. Art is bigger than paint and pixels. We all can create something. Yes we can. Yes we can.

Scariest Thing I've Seen This Week

The Giant's Bride

The old giant gives his trusty paddle to his tiny bride and steps back. She stares at him. He rubs his chin with his enormous hands waiting for a reply. She just stares. He speaks, "I'm done playing ping pong." No response. Wide-eyed silence. The giant tries again, "I'm done for good. It's over." She shifts slightly in her fur coat. She's spent years buying herself nice things. Nicer than the fur even. All in attempt to garner the attention of her humongous husband. He always chose ping pong. A strange obsession, but obsession nonetheless. Years worth of evenings were spent in separate rooms. Until now.
Now, the giant is ready to change.

St. Elizabeth

I spent the past two days with my team (work not kickball) at St. Elizabeth's- a former catholic church bought by a bunch of Vineyardites. Some people (building/health inspectors) don't find the run down, old and haggard quality of Ms. Izzybeth quite as endearing as I do. They're constantly issuing pieces of paper that use words like "condemned" and "shut this place down or we'll throw you in the clink." I love this place and I'll be sad if it ever gets "restored." The stained glass glows in beautiful contrast/harmony with the chipped paint and bare brick of the inside walls. The grand quietness of the vaulted/arched ceilings combined with Norwood sirens and muffler-less cars creates a unique, holy experience. When the skies went dark at 4pm the handful of working lights struggled to illuminate the space without the help of the glowing stained glass. Something about how the inside of this old church needs the outside struck me. An exchange between the two is necessary for physical and metaphorical reasons. I'm still wrestling with what those are. Maybe one is that a church without the influence of the outside community is a dark, quiet vault of unreached/undiscovered potential. And vice versa. Maybe. Like I said, still wrestling.

Day two there was a fire across the street. Norwoodians like watching fires. Sans shirts.

Lil' Meatloaf

My pocket-sized, future rock-diva of a friend mat milthaler has a weblog. While on our roadtrip Joe and I decided we would some day make our fortune writing and producing a one man rock and roll show featuring Mister Milthaler. Imagine Meatloaf + Freddie Mercury + Bette Midler with robotic lights and smoke. Live in Reno! Mat and I actually rapped together way back in the day. Little known fact...this Renaissance Man is a descendant of the secret love affair between Leonardo DaVinci & female tasmanian devil. If his weblog reflects this 100% true fact we're all in for a treat.

Back in the day

I must be feeling nostalgic er something. I plugged in my old hard drive and found these little doozies.They're fantastically and wonderfully bad. My buddy Jeremy and I led a young adult gathering as volunteers (2003ish) and spent our free time making ridiculous videos. Amazing how much and how little has changed...

Morning Sounds

9am sunday morning. sitting outside on my tiny deck. lots of sounds. morning doves impersonating owls. distant dogs shouting at each other. cicadas buzzing and dying. miss jackson's teeth nipping together eating said cicadas. kids chasing each other. my toilet flushing upstairs. a motley crew of birds harmonizing. woodpecker doing his best to play percussion for everyone but struggling to keep tempo with the unorthodox rhythm. squaking, crow-like birds flying overhead. miss jackson stepping ungracefully thru the ivy in hunt of more cicadas. leah sneezing inside (avoiding bug bites-she's very sweet and the bugs know it). neighbor doing a STOMP routine filling a wheelboro with something (wood maybe) and dropping a bucket on the ground. a blackish bird splashing clean in our bird bath. cars honking-seems early for honking. miss jackson pushing open the squeaky door with a stick in mouth to join leah inside. my empty coffee cup snapping its fingers for a refill. my keyboard going quiet....