Secret Still

As the title of this post implies, Monday is that most savage of days when we all realize that the weekend was too short, too restless, and too scattered to have really been much of a break at all. The cure that works best for me, when all I can think about is how I’d rather be sitting with my legs dangling into the lake than crossed under my unergonomically designed office chair, is music. Music does soothe the beast that is Monday. And so to spread the wealth of good feelings that I’m listening to today I give you some links to ear and eye candy of the distracting-till-the-day-is-over kind. Enjoi.

First off, for those of you who pay very little attention to the links on our sidebar, which we have carefully selected by hand for their delicious odor and tender, juicy insides, there are several good music blogs near the middle-bottom. I urge you to use any and all of them today in order to take your mind off of your comfortable and inviting bed that you had to leave at 7:00AM.

Second, Cliptip, the always stylish and tasteful music video blog, has posted a slew of new videos from artists you have and haven’t heard of. I especially like the Gnarls Barkley video for Smiley Faces. I have a limited pressing, red-vinyl 10″ of that single (won it in their myspace poster design contest), and this video makes that song come to life in a whole new way. And what could be a higher compliment for a music video? Go watch visual and aural artistry at its best until your heart’s content.

Third, (since I’m apparently being numerical today) is a CD that I stole from the Girl over the weekend, because she wasn’t there to stop me and I totally am in charge of her anyway (I am going to get my ass kicked). It’s called Le Sacre Du Sauvage or Ritual of the Savage by Les Baxter. If you haven’t heard of Mr. Baxter (and that’s a fair chance) you can click here to learn more about his career. When I first heard this album I had no idea who made it, all I knew was that I loved it. It sounds like the music that would be playing on an all white, egg-shaped hi-fi set in the mod decorated penthouse apartment of a Paris playboy and his flight-attendant wife on a sparkling Sunday afternoon. You can almost feel the soft white shag carpet under your feet as you listen to it. Baxter and his various orchestras were the quintessential creators of “exotica,” a brand of music created around the rhythms of brasilian swing and jazz, a sort of bossa-nova/conga crossing with bebop elements thrown in for fun. Before this I had only heard Tamboo!, because one night in my dorm room, back when I was a lonely, alcoholic, Everquest-playing Freshman, I got just drunk enough and had been traveling through various music channels to stumble upon an exotica network that was playing the album in its entirety. I danced my drunken ass off to it in a wobbly hip-shaking manner and made myself some ramen which were half eaten before I passed out. In my world that was a pretty positive review. Listen to it anyway, and discover something that your life might have been missing without your knowing it ever existed. This is the reason for all those damn flowered shirts and tiki figurines we’ve come to despise as a society.

And finally, something not music related at all, but still damn interesting. A project by Anthony LaSall and Seth Kushner that tries to pin down just why Brooklyn is such a great place to be. The project is titled The Brooklynites and features photographs and short interviews with the famous, infamous, and everyday residents of New York’s most eclectic borough. If I were the Brooklyn Council I would definitely use this project as a publicity campaign. I only read the first four pages and I want to move there eventhough a city the size of Athens makes me claustrophobic. I might just try it. We all need a little spice.

Quote of the Day (for yesterday):
“Yeah, Jeremiah has sort of a man-crush on Elijah Wood” - Me to Dana, because Jeremiah rented two Elijah Wood movies without knowing it (Everything is Illuminated and Green Street Hooligans)

On the weekends I normally shy away from the internet like a heartbroken 19-year-old shies from a Valentine’s Dance, but with the girl gone away for the weekend and all my books packed I had little else to occupy my time. Good thing for you, my friends, because here are two very nice links that I gleaned from Metafilter.

The first is something that I have dreamed about for years and on occasion had impure thoughts about, and that is Boardpusher. Most of you have probably heard of Cafe Press by now, maybe even made some t-shirts with a clever picture and phrase like “Fork You” and then a picture of a spoon. Boardpusher works along those same lines, in that you make a design, in whatever style you want, and then they will put it on a skateboard deck just for you. Unlike Cafe Press, which works on consignment for the most part and offers a wide variety of printable products, you can only get skateboard decks at Boardpusher. But I ask you: What more could you possibly want? I’m gonna start working on designs in my free time, and I’ll probably post them here so that you, the readers, all 18 of you, can vote on which one you think I should go with. The question then is: should I skate the deck or just put it on the wall under a flattering track light?

Our second meta-gem of the day comes from the fine, nerd-lauding folks at IGN. They somehow, and I’m not going to wager a guess as to how or judge them outright for it, somehow got ahold of the first 24 minutes of A Scanner Darkly. The movie, from what I can tell of it by the first 24 minutes, which is relatively little, seems so far to be a bit more playful than Richard Linklater’s predecessor film Waking Life. I loved Waking Life in all it’s philosophical, intellectual-stoner-friendly glory. This new film, starring, for some ungodly reason, Keanu Reeves (his name means cool breeze) is a bit more toungue-in-cheek and is working better for it. The wry, dark humor of Philip K. Dick books was something I noticed a lot of people overlooked. I only noticed hints of it until I read Confessions of a Crap Artist. A Scanner Darkly was the book that I read just before tackling the mammoth Valis Trilogy, so you have to imagine that I like Scanner a lot in order to throw myself into a complex work like Valis. Now, after all that explanation, you may click here to watch the first 24 minutes of the Warner Independent film. I, for one, was impressed and delighted, and I say delighted with the least amount of mincing possible for a straight man.

In other news I have been taking time today to stare at the driftwood in one of my terrariums that serves as a sort of waterfall. It has been worn down in a very interesting pattern from the flow of water over it, and I have been geeking out about the fact that I have watched the entire transformation from the beginning. It’s kind of God-like. We terrarium people, this is the sort of thing that gets us off.

Oh, and unrelated to that, if you’re in the Athens area today and want to get drunk and alienate an entire crowd, Kyle and Scott are having their going away roast today. My veggie chili and blue cheese corn muffins (lowercase letters now that they’re actually made) are fucking phenomenal and it was everything I could do to not eat them all by myself. I’m a fat person in a model’s body. I bet that pisses the fatties out there off. I don’t care. Fuck you, fatties. Go eat some ham or something.

I’m redesinging the site today (and chances are I won’t finish), but it’s going to take a fair amount of time and concentration. And I’m starting research on an essay for the blog entitled: Is Adventure Dead (tentatively titled)

Then I have to go to the grocery store and get fixin’s for the Veggie Chili and Blue Cheese Corn Muffins I’ll be making tomorrow for Kyle and Scott’s Going Away Roast.

And somewhere in there I have to feed The Girl’s cat, hang out with my dog, pack some more stuff, shower, shave, actually bake the corn muffins, and still find time to maybe go out and have fun tonight.

All I really wanted to do this weekend was go camping. I’ve just been drifing off all day to think about the woods and how much I miss them. I am not a city person.

So with all that happening I have but one link for you to peruse:
Click Here to learn about the future of your lawnmower. I promise it’s more interesting than it sounds.

Quote of the Day:
“Best title so far: Landgrab: The Taking of Poletown” - Kyle, about a movie he found in the basement.

Holy shit, man. Tron Shoes.

These are available from Greyone. They’re 20% off along with a lot of others, and you can read about it here, on their blog.

First off, just let me gay out for a second without judging my heterosexuality in its entirety. The new season of Project Runway is shaping up to be middle of the road. None of the designers seemed that interesting, and neither did their designs. And who in the hell let the crazy, old, basket-hat, whiny voiced guy Vincent stay on that damn show? The first ever hip-hop guy, Michael, made a fucking radical dress that was innovative and stylish out of coffee filters! Why didn’t that win? Do I have to tell you that he is named Michael Knight? Michael Knight was Knightrider, you twinkly-toed blindpersons! I’m gonna keep watching, Bravo, but you’ve been warned.

Last night on the Daily Show there was coverage of the Net Neutrality Act. Click Here to learn what you really need to know about the internets.

In the art world there is a collaboration going on between artist Jeremy Fish and Emcee Extraordinaire Aesop Rock at the Fifty24SF Gallery. All the proceeds go to the 286 Valencia creative writing program.

If you need a laugh and are interested in the movie business go check out Jeremy Slater’s blog. And maybe pick up a Rapebear t-shirt.

Ask A Ninja was on NPR the other day talking about Pirates of the Caribbean. Click Here to watch what radio can only let you listen to.

I’m sorry, Radio, I didn’t mean that as a slight. We still cool? Cool.

Quote of the day (really from last night):
“There’s a whole lot of straight guys on this queer show” - Me, about Project Runway

I love Craigslist. People are awesome.

Where the hell is Hollywood, GA?

Ernest Hemingway had once boasted that he could write a novel that was only six words long. Asked to prove it, he took a napkin and wrote, “For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

I just got an e-mail whose subject was “HFW” and that’s all. Here is the e-mail in it’s entirety:

end up like Knuckles Itzak, who got stuck at dawn in an open space. He got
as though the formation were a giant knife, and eight thousand gull-eyes
was shouting:
“Good!” said Chiang and there was victory in his voice.

Clearly the internet has started thinking for itself. Now I’m going to have to take some mushrooms and see if I can’t communicate directly with it. I’ll be the guy with the CAT cable in his ear.

For more on people hallucinating and finding Universal Truth Click Here.

For more information on Psilocybin and how it works Click Here.

For an good idea of what you’ll look like if you eat hallucinogenic mushrooms Click Here.

Several of the designers that won the National Design Award this year for Communication Design stood up for what they believe in. You can read more about it here. So, does a couple of designers making a stand matter in the long run? It matters to them, and that’s what counts.

Oh, and while I was sort of yelling at myself yesterday, because when I get all loud the Girl tends to tune me out, I hit a good idea. Since every year we all get bombarded with “Go Vote” campaigns, and then we all just elect more of the same riffraff, I think it would work to everyone’s advantage if we all didn’t vote. If everyone can just not vote maybe things will start moving toward change. It’s time we realized that the lesser of two evils is not fucking good enough.

I swear to God this is the most fucking awesome and creepy and ridiculous animal on the planet, and I love it like my own child.