I won't rest till I buy your land

Tomorrow you're going to get my top 10 albums of 2010, which is really today, it's very late. In anticipation I've decided to give you a little treat. #1 song of the year:



If you don't agree comment or I don't really care

The Nativity 21st Century Style.

"It's all of you who make it great"

The Ho Ho Ho-down was a success again this year. I want to thank everyone for coming out because as the title says, it's all of you who make it great. I also want to give a special thanks to my wonderful sister for capturing all of the Santa pics. You're amazing at what you do. Any interested in checking out more of her work you can find her blog here!

There's a stale donut on my desk

I didn't ask for it. I don't want it. But there it sits...

I think I might be getting sick. This is very bad news, since I've got a large number of people to entertain come Saturday. Luckily I've got a bunch of the decorating already finished. Check it:

I'm actually probably getting sick from being up too late working on all this nonsense. Or maybe it's from the multiple walks to Home Depot, usually in torrential rain. Either way I have to figure out a sure fire way to fight this thing. First things first - pho...

I really want my warehouse-mates to do a cover of the Bed Intruder song on Saturday. Hopefully it happens. I'm thinking something acoustic like these guys put together:



Sometimes I'm a bird or candy or a butterfly or an elephant or a frosted pint glass full of 4 Loko...

We need MORE holiday music! MORE festiveness!!!!

It doesn't seem like we're going to be playing holiday music at work this year. I've been listening to it at home for weeks now. Starting today I'm bumping it at my desk till I go on vacation. I figure someone needed to man up and get festive on this.

What's in store?

Somehow a conversation about getting a pet dinosaur led to strange danger led to Architecture in Helsinki. That led me to this video:





Which led me to a great Youtube comment...
BattleCatX: This video makes me feel like I took an SNES cartridge, ground it up into fine pieces and snorted it.. it's sweet!


And now this blog post has led you through all of it as well.

This is where I want to be right now

Double tragedy: Big Red's last stand and Washroom deluge

Last night began as any other early December Thursday could, but suddenly took a turn for the tragic. I met with some peoples up at the Redwood on Capitol to watch Thursday night football. The beer was flowing, the game was competitive and merriment abounded. After the Eagles victory we decided to head back down to Sodo for a little Catan to top off the evening. It was a decent game, which is to say that I won, but then everything went wrong...

Big Red's Last Stand:
At some point during the game I'd set an old friend by my side. Many know him by one of two names, Ben or Big Red. Big Red has been a part of the scene for nearly a decade now.

It was in the late spring of 2001 that he came into my life. A friend of mine and I went out to the Ave and I can't remember all the finite details but in the end my friend found Big Red. When we were bringing Ben back to the dorms there was a conversation about how to conceal him from those that might want to cause him harm. "[he's] a vase for my mother" was the cover story.

As the school year came to a close Ben had to find a new home. He couldn't just live in the dormitory closet all summer. So I took Ben with me. We had some crazy times that summer and eventually we both ended up in Federal Way. After some time stuck in treefingers we both returned to the U District and lived on the hillside off 22nd and then again in the house on 15th. He'd become apart of the group.

When I moved to Alki so did Big Red and then again to the apartment on Avalon. We were nearly inseparable. He went everywhere I went until I left West Seattle. At that time there were others who needed Ben more than I did and as Mr Bergstrom would say, "that's the problem with being middle-class, anybody who really cares will abandon you for those who need it more."

I lost track of Big Red for some time. I alway knew he was around but we didn't see each other for some time. He had a couple of minor accidents and was out of commission for a while. When I started spending more time in Sodo I came to find that he was there too! He had a couple of broken limbs but nothing a trip to the market couldn't solve. In a few weeks we were back in business.

However he wasn't the same. At some point he fractured his torso and had to be treated with a degree of delicacy. Now during the game of Catan I had Big Red next to me, a true right hand man. Upon claiming victory I exclaimed and, in a moment worthy of Pangford, Big Red toppled to his doom. There were shards of red glass littered around like bloodied body parts on a battle field. I was in total shock. It wasn't completely unexpected but that didn't make the situation any less tragic. Just as I was about to settle into mourning it got worse...

Washroom Deluge:
I was about to step outside and reminisce about my old friend when I hear someone yell, "water!" I look down the studio hallway and sure enough inches of water were spewing from the laundry room. It had already consumed three passage ways by the time I made it to the source. The waste water hose from the washer had become dislodged from the drainage pipe and was spewing murky water at an unprecedented rate.

I got the hose back into the pipe and we shut down the washer to prevent further chaos, but the damage was already done. Every towel available was in motion, sopping up as much as possible and then being rung out only to start again. People were screaming for help as they continued to try to stop any water from making it's way into the great room. Luckily a blanket was on the couch nearby and we were able to use it as a dam to stop the river.

For about an hour we fought the rising tide, which wasn't rising much since we stopped the flow, but you get the idea. We'd won the battle with minimal damage. It was hard fought but we won.

When the panic subsided I remember the loss from early and decided there was nothing more I could do but simply go to bed. As I laid in my bed I couldn't help but think, "the gods have punished us." Now I just have to figure out why and atone for our failings.

Any of you with good memories of Big Red or the Deluge hit em up in the comments I'd love to hear your take on it all.

Is she offering?

I want a confetti canon

(thanks to NESF for the find)

I'm just a wee lad

Old People are Great

Kid Cudi / Kanye West Reviews

So instead of doing what everyone else seems to be doing, talking about snOMG, I'm gonna talk about music.

During the packing I got discourage and decided that some new music was needed to motivate me. So I cruised down to Sonic Boom and picked up the new Kid Cudi album "Man on the Moon Part 2: The Legend of Mr Rager." Solid album. It's much darker than his debut release, like any good second installment in a trilogy is. The beats are solid and Cudi's flows are spot on. The addition of Mary J Blige on a couple of tracks came out really well as did the track with Cee-Lo, but Kid Cudi seems to be his best when left alone. Highlights on the album include "Mr Rager", "REVOFEV" and "These Worries". I'm going to give this one an 8.7

Yesterday I got to work and started reading some reviews of Kanye West's "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" and all I could think was, can it really be that good? I mean Pitchfork gave it a perfect 10, the first time for a new release since Kid A. (CORRECTION: Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot was the most recent to receive a 10.0) Could Kanye really put out an album to rival Radiohead? Well the answer is no, however that being said it's still a really good album. The first time I listened to it I didn't get the full picture of what was going on. It took listening to it during my snow commute last night to get the total impact. The sound that he's created is dense to say the least, but not in a bad way. Really the only down side is that some of the tracks seem to go on a minute or two too long which makes it a bit redundant at times. I was very pleased to hear some good Kanye again. He hasn't really done anything worthwhile since Late Registration and I was hopeful that he'd come out with something solid and I wasn't disappointed. Highlights on the album include "Power", "Blame Game" and "All of the Lights" (I love anything with Rihanna). Gonna have to up my original rating from 8.9 to 9.4

Moving on down

So I guess I should mention that I'm moving. This weekend actually. I haven't mentioned it before because there was sort of delicate situation involved. However it's all out in the open now. The new spot is kind of a 180 from where I was. Instead of the quiet residential streets of Ballard I'm going to be mobbin' the nitty gritty streets of SODO.

There are numerous reasons for the change. First and foremost THE RENT IS TOO DAMN HIGH!!! I'm going to be cutting my living expenses by more than half. Yeah I won't have as much personal space like in my apartment, but in the end it wasn't worth the cost. I'm also going to have a set of room mates again. I'm kind of looking forward to that actually. The last room mate scene had a sour ending but all in all I miss living with people. It's nice to have someone real to talk to when you get home, not just text on a screen.

There are a couple of other major selling points. The place has a full recording studio so I'll be able to start working on some recording. I just have to learn how to use the equipment and then it's on. Hopefully it won't be too long after the move that I'll have something to post for you all. I did mention I'm starting a hip-hop project right? Either way, I am. There's also ample space to start brewing again. I'll have to purchase everything again, but it would be nice to get back to the fermenting. I miss the smell of yeast and hops.

So if you ever find yourself down near "Slander" (that'd be Sixth and Lander) hit me up and we'll do it proper. And by proper I mean we'll bust out the burn barrel and start a nice little fire by the tracks while we drink malt liquor and cook cans of chili over an open flame. Ha, I'm just messin' with y'all...or am I?

"But mommy I want it!"

I really want to eat Thanksgiving dinner right now. Actually I wanted it yesterday and I didn't get it. I don't think I'll get it today either. I guess that just means it will be that much better when the time comes. My sister also makes a great turkey dinner spread, this isn't hers, but next time around I'll be sure to have a picture of it.

I don't much care for yams though. You hear that sister, NO YAMS!!!! Well I'm not going to deny anyone else yams, but you can replace mine with more stuffing and green bean casserole....mmmmm casserole *drool*.

I'll do something nice for the first person to correctly identify the origin of this blog title. Hit it up in the comments.

"Raisin' up outta this gangsta shit"

I was riding the 7 downtown last night and overheard a conversation between two younger men. One was probably about 15 years old and the other couldn't have been more than 20. They were going back and forth about mutual acquaintances, who had a baby, who was in jail, etc, before the older guy asked, "You still going to class." The younger boy mumbled, "yeah kinda." This opened the flood gates. The older guy started laying it down with things like, "The only way you're raisin' up outta this gangsta shit is with an education", "Stay in class, you best believe that", "my mama told me and I'm'a keep telling you - school is where its at", and "All those fools who wanna be bangers you know where they end up? Dead or in jail. Is that what you want? Not me." After the younger guy got off the bus I decided to talk to this guy a little. Turns out he's a sophomore at the University of Washington. You'd never have guessed from his attire and demeanor. He was wearing pants that covered his knees not his ass and a giant puffy coat. He told me about how he was majoring in political science, "learning all that gov'ment shit" and how next quarter he was going to take his first international studies course. In the end he hopes to run for public office and start making a difference for all the people he grew up with, not just the kid from earlier. It wasn't until I got off of the bus that I realized I'd never even asked him his name. So to whoever you are, keep on doing what you're doing. It's people like you that will make our future better than our past.

"I'm not a witch, I'm a potato eater"

Strange news from the other side of the planet

I was in contact with the ever elusive Pangford today. Here's a transcript of the conversation. I hope that you all find it as entertaining as I did:

< Desomniac >

< Pangford >

I want to tell my story caught on the beach but I've now built so much pressure that I feel I have to call out the combination of both the Welsh and Scottish guy in the office to direct a story half way to Ireland in the old stone coble pub with wise man fisherman style telling

what to do ! shit

this weekend I was able to view the same women cuter off all her hair, shove it in her mouth clasp her hands to the sky and submerge herself in seran wrap

LOL LOL what the fuck are you talking about!?!?!??!

after that I saw her stuff a bottle of baby powder in her mouth, blow it out and engulf herself in 100 % pure honey

I'm not shitting you

wow

do you have pictures?

well the hair cutting wrapping part was recently video taped of her inside a mall but infront of the full wall projection she continued with the battle among herself and her stalkings, the baby powder mouth feeder, and the honey

she is this interesting 40year old french artist I met this weekend

and she related the cutting of her hair to the remembrance of post world war 2

when her father told her the story of how in their home town the locals gathered all the known prostitutes and french women who were believed to have slept with german soldiers

then in the town center they cut off their hair

I though it was relating to a similar belief my hindi friend told me about entering a temple and offering your most beautiful natural possession and I asked her and she told me and she then gave me a jar of honey

good day sir, I must leave for work

did you rub it all over yourself?

do i get you for christmas?

i hope hope hope so

My buddy does and I will get them for you

pictures i'm referring to

sweet "sow" pork

with half bowl of rice

"flied lice you plick"

bye bye

later

Start over - again

I'm sure I've blogged this before, but it seems fitting right now.

SCIENCE!!!

About to head out for the Life Science Research Weekend at the Pacific Science Center. Hopefully it's good. YAY SCIENCE!!!! I'll post some pics when I get back. Oh yeah, I also have to do a post about last weekend. Maybe I'll do that at some point too.

Since I can't vote in person any more (which really pisses me off) this digital sticker will have to do. 

I remember

Tomorrow is election day. I hope that you all remember to vote. Watch this clip first and it might also help you remember a couple of other things.

I'm not dead yet

Just don't have much to say to you all.

Prop 19 and the aftermath

Now I don't live in California however as a fellow West Coast resident I want to say a few things about Prop 19.

First off, I support Prop 19 100%. I have long wondered why we don't legalize the use of marijuana if for no other reason that the tax revenue. I read an article a couple years back that said marijuana was the 5th largest "cash crop" in Washington state, just ahead of cherries. That could represent a substantial amount of tax revenue, especially here in Washington where "sin taxes" are the norm.

It makes sense that California is the first to take it on because they're having even more budget problems than we are and let's be serious here: Humboldt County. 'Nuff said. So I encourage everyone in California to vote YES ON PROP 19!!!!

That being I said I want you all to understand what is going to happen. When Prop 19 passes the federal government is going to sue the state of California. Now before you get all pissed off about how when you voted for Obama you never thought he would do such a thing. He has no other choice. The fact is that Prop 19 violates the federal governments authority. It's the same reason that they sued Arizona over SB1070 (Immigration).

However by voting yes on 19 you're sending a strong message to the country that the time for marijuana reform is now. While the law is being argued through the various courts it may be enough pressure to convince the Californian representatives to start pushing for a national bill, allowing the states to self regulate their own marijuana policy. It'd be hard to lose the votes for that one. Democrats in blue states will support it if only to  defer the problem to local politicians. Republican, especially Tea Party candidates, are consistently arguing for smaller federal presence and more state control. So unless they want to pull a 180 on one of their core believes they're going to have to support the reform. Then Prop 19 stands and every other state is going to have a referendum vote on the issue. Everyone wins.

Now this would be a best case scenario and what it really requires is that first you pass the law. Then when it passes and the government steps in, write your senate. Write your congressmen. Write everyone you can. This is where those of us in other states join your battle. So I encourage anyone out there in California to get out and approve Prop 19 now because we've got your back later.

Hi are you one of those...

Late Night Show

Soak us in animal blood

The meaning of life?

Yesterday was 10/10/10. If you translate that into binary you get the number 42. So it could be argued that yesterday was the meaning of life. That is if you believe Douglas Adams was right. And that binary is the true language. And that the Gregorian calendar is in fact the true measure of time. And that for some reason this time it happened was somehow more significant than the last. Mostly it comes down to whether you're willing to put enough faith in so many things that are mere creations of man. It wasn't a bad day by any means, but it wasn't the best either. I guess that it could have been the meaning of life, in the sense that any given day could be...

Chili Cook Off was good times. Ray and Jen did a great job of hosting the event. I hope that it is the beginning of many successful cook offs to come. My quest for the winning chili failed yet again, but there's always next year...

Life's kind of complicated right now, but I don't really want to get into that. So instead I'll leave you with a little Deerhunter...

Happy 70th Birthday John Lennon

Crazy to think he would have turned 70 this year. In honor of the occasion I've compiled these videos for you all. Hope you enjoy.

Long walks, blogs and solitary confinement

Last night I was walking downtown to catch the bus home and for some reason decided to try just walking all the way home. I went down along the waterfront, through Elliot Bay Park, cut over to 15th just before Interbay, over the Ballard Bridge, up Ballard Avenue, and finally made it to the final march up 24th. The whole time I kept convincing myself that I wouldn't make it the whole way. "I'll just make it to the end of the park and then catch the bus." "I'll just go to the bridge and catch the bus" And so on. I'm actually very pleased with myself for making it the whole way. I google mapped my course and it worked out to be 8.4 miles. It told me there are other shorter ways to go, so I might have to try another route while the weather is still good...

For those of you who haven't noticed Joseph is back to blogging! YAAAAY!!! I really enjoy his blog. Great photography and always an interesting little blurb. Check it out if you haven't yet...

Lil Wayne is in solitary for listening to an unauthorized music device. I think it's fitting that it's his true love that got him put in the hole. Still need to get his new album. Haven't read many reviews but a coworker recommended it. FREE WEEZY!!!

I can't believe that the chili cook off is this weekend. I don't think I'm going to be much of a contender, unless P decides to do a joint entry. Then I'd be guaranteed a victory. He's never lost....

Speakin' of Lil Wayne, here's the new video for the track he did with Eminem:

Can you smell the Fragrance?

Great weekend all around.

Friday night I went over to P's for some pizza and a bottle of Jameson. It wasn't long before we ended up going over to Sully's. I took some pictures, but apparently I'd had a few too many ales and none of them turned out too well. What I really wanted was a picture of the bartender, because she's the best reason to go there. Not only was she unbelievably beautiful but really friendly, up until I asked if I could take her picture. At least I asked right?

One of the things we talked about at the bar was going up to Bellingham and doing a little hike. I woke up Saturday around 12 and it was about an hour later that P showed up at my place. Kaz called just in time and we swooped him up too.

The ride up was pleasant. P was a little aggressive, but it led to some comical events. The main reason for going to Bellingham was because P wanted to get some soap. So we hit up Otion only to find they didn't have what he was looking for.

So we bombed south on the Chuckanutt Drive, great views, to Larrabee State Park. Now I chose this hike because it was under 5 miles and I didn't want to destroy my body since I'm pretty out of shape. I should have paid more attention to the elevation gain. We went up 1000 feet in about 1.5 miles. It destroyed me, but I did it. Strange thing, on the way up we found a shoe in the wilderness:

The lake was pretty cool. The water was so still that the trees reflected perfectly on the surface.

There were also some GIANT rock formation, these pictures really don't do them justice

We had decided to skip the viewpoint on the way up, hoping that it would be more spectacular on the way back since the sun would be closer to the horizon. We were right. Here's the view of Samish Bay, Lummi Island, and some of the San Juans.

After the hike we stopped by Angel of the Winds for some food and the end of the Huskies game (GO DAWGS!!!).

Major shout out to P and Kaz for the great company.

I'm excited, can you tell?

"Don't say I've changed because, man, of course I have"

I was out at a bar last night with an old friend. And as usual we got into some great conversation. During our back and forth he made the comment: "You've changed. You used to be so carefree about life." This led to a lengthly discussion, but even more thinking after the fact.

It's true I have changed. In my younger days I didn't worry about anything. I lived life for the moment. When I was 19 I had decided that I wanted to have 20 years of life experience in 2, mostly because I'd determined I wasn't going to life past 30 (I wasn't suicidal just convinced fate had a tragic end in my future), and I feel that in many ways I accomplished that goal.

One of the first things that changed about me after this was my relationship with the idea of death. I'm not exactly sure how or when it happened, but I no longer believed I was destine for an early grave. I think that this is largely attributed to the overwhelming amount of reading I did on the subject of religion, spirituality and specifically gnostic texts.

Through their study I was able to realize that while God/fate/whatever you want to call it can be cruel it's overall reason for being is to bring about good. And not good like a candy bar tastes good, good in way that we can't describe with our faulted human languages. I'll still make an attempt to. It's more in the sense that there is a perfection that coats everything like an thin dusting of snow that is often difficult to see, if possible at all, but is always there.

I actually used this concept in titling this blog, as Desomnia is a portmanteau of desolate and amnesia that I use to describe the life outlook of trying to forget the unfortunate or ugly parts of life. And Drull is a desolate and forbodding sense of forgiveness, or the good that I spoke of early. I struggled for a long time to find a way to express this idea and in the end there weren't any words for it yet so I found words. And it went far beyond just a blog title and became a sort of ethos for my life.

This is where the most substantial change came from. Where as before I had a very loose idea about life and it's grander implication I was able to live my life without caring about anything. As I developed these ideas I found myself becoming more and more grounded in them. That's not to say that I lost my free spirit, but instead of letting it run wild it has a rooted foundation that I find allows me to grow more and more as time passes.

It's easier to just go with the wind when you're younger, as you get older you have to decide which gusts will guide your life. However I still allow myself to be shaped by the winds of fate much like the trees that grow along the Oregon shores.

Now I'm not really sure where I'm going with all of this. Mostly just thought it might help me to try to express these ideas and hence better understand them myself. Especially since I'm about to throw myself at the will of fate yet again. Lets hope it all goes well.

The things we find nostalgic

Back in High School one of my classmates had this cartoon on his binder. It always made me laugh. It still does.

I want one

Okapi: the only living relative of the Giraffe

There's only one way to salvage this day

Reformatting

So as you probably noticed I did some reformatting this morning along with adding a new banner pic. I'm interested to hear what you think. Better? Worse? Let me know.

RIP Jack Horkheimer

I was at home last night watching a little Red Green Show. Now Red's on between 10 and 11 on channel 12 and after each episode they play the short "Jack Horkheimer: Star Gazer". I was shocked last night to see that it wasn't Jack! Jack passed away last month. This is a tragic loss to the astronomy community and to star gazers, young and old, around the country. The new guy just isn't the same but I'm hopeful that in time he will come to be. It's hard to best Jack though. So to Mr Horkheimer, I bid you farewell and wherever you are I'm sure that you'll "keep looking up".

In a perfect world

This would become a full length movie:

"Halcyon Digest" streaming on NPR

That's right people, the new Deerhunter can be streamed NOW! I'm very pleased so far. I've listened to it about three times and it's grown on me more with each go around. If you don't have time to listen to the whole thing this is my favorite track so far. That being said it really should be experienced as a whole.

I woke up too early and have nothing better to do than dress like your niece

Went to bed really early last night which has led to my being up really early this morning. At a loss for what to do with myself I decided to spend the morning with Radiohead in honor of their completing some new material. Here's a section of the playlist I've got going on.

One more for good measure.

"They got money for wars, but can't feed the poor"

Let's talk about poverty for a moment. There were two stories that came out today about the subject. The first saying that poverty on a global level is declining, albeit not everywhere, but still as a whole. The second is about poverty in the US specifically and how the rate is increasing substantially.

Now I'm all for a lower global poverty percentage, I think you all could have guessed that. However it begs the question, why are rates in the US increasing against the global trends? This isn't anything new though, it's been happening for years, as you can see in this chart found in a study by UCSC:

Now that only compares the top 20% with the lower 80% and even  there you can see that the rich are getting richer at the expense of the middle and lower classes. The Working Group on Extreme Inequality has compiled a plethora of graphs and chart showing the distribution of wealth in America, including this one:

As you can see the bottom 50% of American's control only 2.5% of the wealth. 2.5%!!! If you don't find this alarming, you should. As this gap between the wealth and the impoverished continues to grow we're going to to see more and more dire consequences.

Wikipedia sites Charles E Hurst's work Social Inequality: Forms, Causes, and Consequences when it states, "Currently, the richest 1% hold about 38% of all privately held wealth in the United States while the bottom 90% held 73% of all debt.^[10]" And we wonder how we ended up with a financial crisis that's been crippling our economic growth for three years so far.

Now there's a lot of people out there that are saying we shouldn't come down on the wealthy because they worked hard to earn what they have. That's simply not true. The system we have in place is set up to keep the rich rich and the poor poor. The Economic Mobility Project has found that, "More than 50 percent of
individuals who start in the bottom income quintile remain there 10 years later, and 70 percent remain below middleincome status. Despite notable changes in the U.S. economy, this immobility at the bottom has remained unchanged since the 1980s."

So where am I going with all of this? There are a couple of things happening in the political arena that apply directly to this problem.

The first I'll mention is Washington State Initiative 1098. The income tax initiative. Currently middle and lower class families are paying 11% of their earnings to state taxes while those with the highest incomes are averaging 3%. This has Washington ranking 50 of 50 in terms of tax fairness. We need to start addressing this problem locally and the first step is to vote YES ON I-1098!

The other thing that you can do is write you senators and congressman regarding the expiration of the Bush-era tax cuts. Everyone agrees that the middle and lower class tax cuts need to remain in place, the issue is over those earning more than $200,000 a year. Now upper class Americans never asked for these tax cuts when they were given and they don't need them.

Yes the economic situation has changed since they were implemented but we can't afford to extend them. Remember what happened when the real estate bubble burst? Imagine what'll be like when the government debt bubble burst. I for see it being much like what happened recently, the rich find more ways to get richer at the expense of others. I for one don't want to see that happen and hope that we can start doing more to deflate it before we're suffering from even worse problems than we have now.

The last thing that you can do has more to do is support education. Education is the best way of leveling the playing field in America. Now this could mean voting for school levies or taking an extra hour to help your own kids with their homework or volunteering to help tutor underprivileged children. All of these thing help children succeed. And for those living in the poorer parts of our country they're going to need every advantage they can get. But just because it's hard to move up doesn't mean it's impossible.

For those of you who don't know, the title of this post is taken from the 2pac song "Keep ya head up". He immediately follows up with the line, "Say there ain't no hope for the youth and the truth is there ain't no hope for the future". The unfortunate thing is that unless we start to address this problem plaguing America, he's right. And we need to start now. If we wait much longer we're going to see the death of the middle class and the "American Dream" in our lifetimes.

True love according to David Lynch

I'm going to tell you a story

It's the a story I like to call "My Saturday". 

I woke up pretty early for a weekend, 7:15am. Probably because I went to bed at 9 o'clock. I thought about going back to sleep, but decided it was best to just get going on the day. After watching C-SPAN for an hour I got myself ready to go apple picking. MNom got me involved with a local volunteer group that goes around picking fruit that would otherwise go to waste and then we donate it to local charities. The tree we were working with was giant!

The picture doesn't do it justice, but you get an idea

It was covered in fruit. The bad part was most of it being too far up for us to reach or not yet ripe. That being said we still harvested over 165 pounds! The plan is to go back on this coming Sunday to get a bunch more. 

After the picking we (NESF, MNom, EA and myself) went down to the Hi-Life for lunch. Good peoples, good times.

Next up was the Washington v Syracuse game. I swooped up PMRob and we watched the game at what used to be Goldie's on 45th, can't remember the name at the moment. Great game! I was more than a little disappointed with the loss to BYU and to be honest wasn't sure what to make of the season after that. The 41-20 victory was a much needed reassurance. 

After the game things were destine to get interesting. 

You see I graduated high school, ten years ago to be exact, and Saturday was our reunion. I'd been torn about going. Everyone from high school that I like I still talk to, so I didn't see much point in going. However when NESF told me that he was thinking about it I gave it some more thought and finally decided it'd be entertaining if nothing else. 

I have my dad's car while he's in San Diego so I offered to drive down to Des Moines, mostly for karma points since I'm never the DD I figured it's about time. No one was really sure how many people to expect. I'd imagined showing up and there'd be 10 other people, boy was I wrong. The place was packed. I've yet to hear an official number but I'd guess about 150 people. 

I chatted with a few people I knew marginally back in the day. The majority of my friends back then were either in a different class or the type of people that I wouldn't expect to see at a reunion, but I had some good conversations nonetheless. 

I actually really enjoyed watching everyone else get smashed. My whole plan was to get PMRob to make an ass of himself, which I think I accomplished in a small sense. The unexpected entertainment came from Raybies. He'd driven down, but after a couple of beer I told him that I'd drive him back to his car tomorrow if he wanted. Best decision of the night. 

Things started to wind down at the reunion but there was word of an after party happening at a Chinese bar around the block. We rolled down there and sure enough 20-30 of em were still going strong with the addition of Karaoke. All the songs selected were the type of music I'd expect from the crowd, "Friends in low places" and the like. Things got pretty sloppy all around at this point. One girl showed up, stumbled into herself and then promptly lied down and kissed the floor. You know, standard stuff in Des Moines. 

We finally got kicked out that place just before 2am. Then it was off to JITB! Oh late night Jack-in-the-Box, what would we do without you? There was a little musical cars in the drive thru and then we headed up to the school to eat our grease in the old parking lot. 

A new neon sign replaced the tattered old failed art project sign

In the last 10 years Mt Rainier has undergone massive changes. They demolished the old campus of haphazardly placed buildings and portables with a giant 2-story building that houses everything. We weren't able to go inside being it was the middle of the night on a Saturday, but we walked around the building reminiscing about old tales of debauchery. Next thing I knew it was 3:15 and time to call it a night. I was getting tired while Raybies and PMRob were getting hung over. 

In the end a good time was had. 

NPR, Hooligans and "False Priest"

I love NPR! Among so many other things they always seem to have the best music streaming before it comes out. I never used to understand why people would donate money to public media (PBS, NPR, etc). Now I've found myself doing it a few times and I'm sure will many more times in my life. I also understand why old people hate teenagers. Damn hooligans. Always out causing trouble and disrupting the peace. Like these kids on the bus today, all hooting and hollering, talking foul and making the scene generally unpleasant. I wish someone would've just shaken them until...But I digress.

Right now NPR is streaming the new of Montreal album "False Priest". I've long been a fan of their work. You may remember I wasn't a huge fan of their last one at first, that is not the case here. I'm loving everything about this right now and I've only listened to the first ten minute. I'm seriously about to start a one man dance party. As NPR said, "The latest release from of Montreal can be summed up in a word: Bonkers." And that's an understatement. Listen to it. Seriously.

False Priest Cover Art

I might have to live blog this one.

"You keep the sunshine, save me the rain"

Summer is officially over in Seattle and I love it. We're back in the mid-50s to mid-60s with a slight drizzle, just like it should be. In honor of this occassion I've broken out the Modest Mouse. It's bringing me great happiness...

So there's a lot of talk about this whole Quran burning in Florida. This one is a little touchy because they have every right to burn the Quran or any book they want. If we allow the burning of our own flag how could we deny someone the right to burn a book? With that being said, just because you can doesn't mean that you should. However I don't think it's going to be terribly effective to have members of the current administration demonize the act. In the end I think that's just going to make them want to do it even more...

My mom has been uploading a bunch of old pictures and amongst them there was a gem. This is me when I was little representing the "Revenge of the Jedi" shirt. I have an uncle who worked for ILM when they were doing Star Wars and had access to some pre-release merchandise before they finalized the name. Unfortunately I don't still have the outfit and if I did I don't think it would fit too well. At least I have the picture now.

Jedi Knight in training

I'm proud to say that I've never watched the Jersey Shore. Not even a clip or advertisement. In today's society I count that as a major win....