The Happy Clam

Aw, MAAN!

2007-03-12T08:29:44Z

It was one of those odd bits of synchronicity.

The other day, I saw what was quite possibly my favorite moment yet from my new favorite podcast, The Show with ZeFrank.

It was This.

I told lots of people about it, then went about my day.

This evening, I checked out one of my favorite blogs, 43folders.com and saw this genius dude again. They were also talking about one of my favorite books to just knock it right out of the park.

Then I checked GENIUS DUDE's Blog and it all went to crappy pants.

For you see, ZeFrank is very obtuse and hidden in his proclamations. He is also one of those people that really knows how to tell a great, life-changing story in less than a minute. But, you must really be a sportsracer to grok what the heck he is talking about most of the time. That's part of the fun, you see.

And what he's been telling me, from the moment I started watching religiously two weeks ago, is that his show is about to end.

I am teary, but thankful for the archives.

Fire Up the Shoesaw, it's Show Promotion Time!

2007-01-30T04:24:46Z

Kay. I do a lot of shows. (Hitting Chicago Design #80 in April, and that's counting the 40 cherubs shows as... four shows. Sure...) That's a creative outlet that I can't shut off, and the number 1 reason I don't blog much. When I do blog about a show, there's usually something special going on.

I've been waiting for this next show to open for a long time. Our little theater company, the little engine-of-renewal-that-could New Leaf, got its hands on the first U.S. production of a David Hare Play.

Crazy, I know. Even more special: it's a really important show. I've found myself trying to create some honest-to-goodness viral marketing for the show, since that's the only kind of marketing we can afford, and recently contacted a Chicago activist blog with the following request. And I need to preface: It's very hard for me to say things I don't mean.

Hello!

I found your site and was very excited to hear about your mission, which is remarkably similar to the mission of my theater company.

New Leaf Theatre, a Chicago storefront theater, is going to be opening The Permanent Way on Jan. 31st, which is a U.S. Premiere play by David Hare (the screenwriter of The Hours, among others). The play is a documentary-style exploration of the privatization of British Rail and the resulting deadly crashes that happened in 2001 - 2003.

This, however, is not just a play about British Rail. It's a story of citizens, victims, and elected and corporate officials dealing (or choosing not to deal) with a tragedy, and dealing with a public works system that doesn't work by design. It's a visceral exploration of the issues that your site and your readers are passionate about, and that we're passionate about - Standing up and taking responsibility for the oversight of the public and private resources that we all share. It's also a reminder of the worst things that can happen when we DON'T stand up - from these crashes to Katrina.

For more specifics on the play, we're on the web at http://newleaftheatre.org/

In any case, because this is a promotion, I didn't want to go ahead and post a bill for the play without your permission. We're a really small theater company doing a big, audacious play about issues that matter to us, and we hope that you and your readers can come, check it out, and fuel the dialogue in the community.

Thanks so much for your time, and good luck with your projects!

I hope you can see this play, opening on Wednesday, and if not, thanks so much for YOUR time.

Lyrics Meme

2006-12-26T06:34:00Z

In a holiday spirit, I'm giving a go at this meme, using my "Nostalgia" uber-mix (which is always on, no matter the holiday). As if that will help you.

Set your playlist on shuffle. Write down the opening lyrics of the first thirty songs that come up. Ask your friends to guess the name of the songs (artist ); bold and reveal the ones that are answered correctly.

1. There are times that walk from you like some passing afternoon
2. Oh Gillian, you're up with the sun, and you've done 100 things before half past nine
3. Dusty screams through doors and imaginary floors
4. I have you called you children, I have called you son
5. If travel is searching and hope what's been found, I'm not stopping
6. Leaf by Leaf and page by page, throw this book away - Ben Folds Five, "Smoke"
7. While you make pretty speeches I'm being cut to shreds
8. I don't know you, and you don't know the half of it - U2, "Dirty Day"
9. It was only one hour ago, It was all so different then
10. The other night, I had a crazy dream 'bout a man in a fishing hat selling magazines
11. I do it for the joy it brings - Ani DiFranco, "Joyful Girl"
12. The Lemon Tree is tree is so pretty, The Lemon Blossom so Sweet - Soul Coughing, "Janine"(kind of a trick question, nice work, bdar!)
13. Here comes Johnny singing oldies, goldies, Be-bop-a-lua, baby what I say - Dire Straits, "Walk of Life"
14. I was there at a standstill on the highway today as that woman got out of her car
15. Do you feel like I do, tired of everything?
16. When you ate I saw your eyelashes, saw them shake like wind on rushes
17. Wake from your sleep, the drying of your tears - Radiohead, "Exit Music (For a Film)"
18. Anyone who's ever had a heart wouldn't turn around and break it
19. I got home this morning with the sun right in my eyes
20. I can only speak the words as quickly as they're coming now, believe me - Kula Shaker, "Hollow Man"
21. Have you seen? Have not will travel Have I missed the big reveal?
22. This place is damp and ghostly, I am already gone
23. I've waited the night over for some word to come
24. How can I just let you walk away, just let you leave with out a trace - The Postal Service - "Against All Odds" (I don't truck with no Phil Collins. Though I do have at least one of his albums. Alas, no wicked old Genesis.
25. Caught in the middle, Carol, we're middle class, we're middle aged
26. Knock Knock, are you alone? No one's out out here, and I was not followed
27. You've never seen no body as divine as she can see reflections in her own eyes
28. Take heart my little friend, and push back your seat - Eels - "Daisies of the Galaxy"
29. I wish it was last september when we could lose ourselves in crowds everyday - Ben Folds - "Emaline"
30. Life used to be lifelike, but now it's more like showbiz - Ani DiFranco, "Dilate"

Inconvenient Truth

2006-12-05T19:51:49Z

Yeah. So this movie is making me literally, quite literally, burst into tears.

I would like to reposition ultra-conservatives free market thinkers as the greedy nefarious fools that they are.

Sleet

2006-12-01T09:45:52Z

I have what could be called a non-intuitive relationship with Winter.

God, this album is making me cry. In that really, really good way. This music is everything I ever wanted to compose. Now, I apparently don't have to.

I sometimes get these looks from people, as if to say: Are you about to have a nervous breakdown?

I wish I could tell them without weirding them out: Sure, sooner or later. it's an inevitable part of the process.

It was worse when I was younger. I remember those periodic situations in the days of my greatest insecurities, when it somehow seemed a very good idea to deal with the world by retreating under a table. Fetally. Alone in my thoughts. I'm talking 15, of course. Ah, 15. Remember how much I scared my friends? God that was great. Not for them, I'm sure. But it was nice to know that it mattered if my world shut down for a while.

Over time, the forges in my mind began to burn hotter than the embers in my stomach and heart. Over time I began to anticipate the winter months, and the first blast of cold air on my forehead, the first snowstorm. Somehow, I began to think of myself as some kind of productivity radiator. Burning hotter, and hotter, through the summer and fall, until the winter months came to chill and regulate the temperature. To signal a comfortable hibernation. A shutdown. A refueling.

The weather has become warmer over the last few years, and there is a shorter period of hibernation each year. The forges start to melt the works, and I see the inevitable breakdown get closer and closer, and I pray for the cold. I pray for the ice to freeze me again, chilling the too-hot blood in my veins, in my head, in my hands. To solidify all my melting walls.

Today, walking home at night after the show, sleet came down in sheets, clattering on the streets and stinging my face. The unseasonably warm temperatures of the last week were washed away, and I clutched my packages close. Smiling of course. I'm like a kid in a candy store walking through a winter storm.

In winter, the temperatures create a dynamic, magic relationship between nature and home. The summer months don't have that kind of magical appeal for me.

Ever had someone from L.A. say "how can you deal with the winter?" Those kinds of questions make me dance with delight.

So, the sleet has fended off the meltdown for another while. I do not fear the meltdowns anymore, they have a magic of their own, and I have a measure of control over who I let see them happen and why... But I vastly prefer the magic of winter. The winds, the uncontrollable and gentle power of the winter storm, The glittering of ice and snow, and the clarity that comes with proper cooling.

I love the madness of opening a window to billowing sheets of snow. If you think I'm nuts, live a little and listen to this album.

Shameless Plug

2006-11-22T05:08:19Z

Look at how needy I am.

Things are really well, can't wait to brine my turkey, can't wait to marsh those potatoes.

I may buy a condo in the very near future. That's been crazy.

It's looking like Nova Scotia will actually happen.

I'm taking a break from design for a few months, and looking forward to that.

And, as we approach Black Friday, I remind you:

If you're using Amazon for any of your holiday shopping this year, you could send a percentage of your purchase to New Leaf Theatre. That's right, you can support my theater company through shameless, hedonistic capitalism.

Just follow this link:

http://newleaftheatre.org/support.html

Have a very happy Turkey day, extended Urban family. I'm thankful for YOU.

A Show That You Must See

2006-10-28T00:33:30Z

So this one has been a challenge. It's a demanding play, and it's the first play I've worked on in a while that pushes me, demands more of my work. And three in the morning or no, painful as it is, I have been rewarded when putting that work in. It's been hard, but I think it's one of the most interesting and passionate plays that you are likely to see this year.

It's also a tiny, tiny theater company producing it. I try to hold off on these theater-pimping emails, for occasions such as this one: This one I mean it. A fantastic script, a fantastic design team, a fantastic director, and a superb ensemble.

For you Cherub folk reading this, this is Devon DeMayo's theater company. She's out of the country right now, but Katie Lennard also worked on the show as costume designer.

http://www.dogandponychicago.org/

DEAD CITY by SHEILA CALLAGHAN
directed by company member Jarrett Dapier
at the Raven Theatre, 6157 N. Clark St.
October 25th November 26th

Dead City is Sheila Callaghan's "love letter to New York that masquerades as hate mail," according to The New York Times. While bringing her sexy hubby his mail one morning, Samantha Blossom notices an envelope from his lover. This sends Samantha spinning out onto the New York streets alone and emotionally dead until she meets a "punk-rock pauper poet" girl half her age. Featuring the raw, passionate energy of Patti Smith, instant message seductions, and catharsis in a kinky club, Dead City is Sheila Callaghan's modern riff on James Joyce's Ulysses. Don't miss this hyper-kinetic, hilarious romp Variety magazine calls "dangerous" and "gripping."

He also told me that That guy from a-Ha had a beautiful voice.

2006-10-10T05:33:44Z

The hardest part about theater for me, the thing that keeps me here instead of say, in film, where I could make a lot more money, is that theater constantly teaches me a lesson of humility. I get a large dose of it every year at Cherubs, and I'm incredibly thankful for it. The moment I rest on my laurels for even half a second, and indulge myself in the kind of thought I did above, is the moment I forget to listen and collaborate with the artists around me. Even if they appear to have checked out. Sorry, especially if they appear to have checked out.

The greatest teacher I ever had, a playwrighting professor at Smith, listened to his students more than any teacher I have ever had since... and engaged them, and found beauty and genius in tiny details of their otherwise mundane work (read="my mundane work." And he'd never admit it, either!). And in front of the rest of the class, who would have been otherwise bored silly with these plays, he'd pluck that piece of genius and wipe away the dust and say "you have something here. Run with it." He is a teaching magician. In one brilliant move he would criticise the student in a way that was entirely non-confrontational - and he would still create the same energized response in them to rework the piece - PLUS he wouldn't actually tell the student HOW to fix the piece. It was like he could turn down the noise in your head so that you could focus on all the brilliant dialogue that was simmering in there.

I'm lucky enough to teach 160 actual geniuses each year. But young and old geniuses still have this trouble with collaboration - with listening - sometimes. It's frustrating when you're the one ahead of the class. That frustration, that attitude - the attitude that makes me throw up my hands and say IT'S HOPELESS - that's my greatest enemy. He tries to give me an out, tries to negotiate some sort of permission with my conscience that it's alright to check out myself.

One thing we hope each year, as a faculty, is that by collaborating and listening and growing SO MUCH each summer, together, each student will head back to whatever learning environment they came from and make some sort of positive difference, by passing on or encouraging that listening and collaborative technique. Like a joyous virus.

In high school, you carve out your identity. It's painful - you're comparing yourself with your parents, with your peers, with your community, and there is a need for you to separate yourself, to choose a path. Hell, it's traumatic. Clearly, I'm still dealing with the choices I made in high school. With hundreds or thousands of students all actively carving out an identity, sometimes actually with sharp implements, it's an easy environment to get lost in. I wish I had had been able to have that playwrighting class earlier in my life, to be able to focus all the noise going on in my life and pick out those shards of beauty. They were all around me. It took seeing someone, many people, a class, all seeing the world from our own perspectives, our own agendas, and then...

Flash! Poof!

Len pointed out two words, now glowing red on the page. We hadn't noticed them, because the play had been pretty dull. We listened closer, and we heard the world humming a different tune. And we all hummed it together.

It was pretty neat. Would've been nice to have some marshmallows there, too.

______________

In related news:

Dudley got a fortune. It read "There is a nice cake waiting for you." He thought it was the funniest thing, he told everybody.

The next day, he came into work and opened the theater for rehearsal after school. A cake was waiting for him, his students having placed a small triangular cookie on top.

Now that's what I'm talking about.

We're in the business of changing people's lives

2006-10-02T20:43:20Z

So it's been a while. Life is what happens when you're busy making plans to write grand-scale LJ posts.

A lot has happened since my last post, but to summarize: I've been disappointed by people. It's this phase I'm going through. I've been disappointed by what I now recognize as... youth. Those youth, why won't they show me their passion. Why do they waste their passion in lethargy? (I'm being purposefully cryptic, sorry, it's just not really appropriate to bad mouth any individuals, it's not really about that.) I've been disappointed in myself, of course. I've been disappointed in my work, which has lost some of its sparkle. Mostly, though, I'm disappointed in people when they forget that...

I went back home recently, and my friends from high school are doing well. They have (to me) suddenly found direction. Important directions. Education. Constitutional Law. Alternative Energies. Foreign Policy with a focus on the Third World. Their social responsibility compasses have stopped spinning, and point straight North. They've each found something to accomplish, something with leverage potential. Small, achievable things that have the potential for exponential change in the world. For the first time, I was in the vulnerable position of not knowing why I do what I do, not understanding what social good happens when I am successful in balancing the vocals with the piano in I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change. As Marni has started saying, "Theater and I broke up." and I wonder if I'm so busy sailing the ship that I'm not steering any more.

Let me tell you what works about theater: There is something different that can happen when someone tells you a story, right to your face. It's life. That gets stripped away with film and television - those emotions you feel, they're blurry or dim reflections of the reality that can happen when you're right there with the storyteller. When you create a successful story, it's even brighter. After performing a solo piece, and talking back with the audience, I'm amazed that in a half hour or so you've made connections, friends for life. Their lives have been touched, and they have touched yours back. You both see things you couldn't see before.

Let me tell you what doesn't work about theater: It's not entertainment. Sorry, it's not. It can be entertaining, but we have plenty in our lives, TOO MUCH in our lives that is entertaining. It's not a lecture, either. People still need to show up, or it's not theater. The problem with theater is that there is no sustainable model for making it successful that doesn't utterly kill its value.

And oh, god, the bickering. The self-doubt. The egos. The psychopathia. The laziness. Mine, yours, theirs. All of ours. It is the gift of the industry. We, the creative team, treat it like a lie, because it is a lie, and we're surprised when the audience doesn't find the value?

I need to find some way to open up my passion, and still live. Still eat, and get married, and have a family. If you can't do both, how disappointing is that? A recent _high-school_ grad told me today that he couldn't afford to help me on a show. Financially. He wants to be in the sound industry, but doesn't have that many contacts, or really, all that much experience. So many friends (all too busy themselves) tell me, "Teach me! I want to be a sound designer! You have the best job in the world!" I'm sure he had a very good reason - hell, he told me his very good reason, there's no money! - but he reminded me of me six years ago... Thinking that I had to give up my craziest dreams so that I could... I don't know. Afford an apartment and a car. The crushing despair of those choices you make when you're young and feel the weight of what you think your parents or whoever, society, wanted for your life... People need to know that they HAVE to express those dreams, and work towards them. The country needs a healthy dose of creative solutions, and they need to come from everybody, and soon. It's not a question of selfishness, of wanting your dreams to come true over the practical needs of your friends or your loved ones. You don't have to martyr yourself and your life to make those long-term visions come true.

People learn from watching the actions of others. Open up your passion, naked, energized, and people will see the value. Then talk with them, make those connections, give them an opportunity to express their own passion. We're in the business of changing people's lives, and we don't have much time.

There are a few scripts I've read this year that made me see a spark. A spark of something bigger. Ways to change the world, ways to change our lives. Finding peace and real self-knowledge through hardship. Visions of disastrous choices and our communal fate. Our communal hope. I hope they resonate. No, I HAVE to make them resonate. One thing about theater that makes it difficult, almost impossible to be successful:

You start with this blueprint. For a house, but not just a simple house, say David Byrne's house in Germany where every piece of furniture resonates and can be played, like an organ. This vibrating, living, musical house. But you still need to hire the contractors. You can't build every piece yourself. You need to be able to explain to each craftsman, in whatever language they speak, that they can't just build any old couch, but a couch that sings... And while you're building this house, which you don't get paid for, you're building seven other houses, so there's the constant interruption, and the need to focus, and the fatigue...

If you took that wonderful blueprint, and told all your friends about your first dinner party, and they get there, and the cabinets have fallen off the walls, and it's really just a box of a pad with a beep that happens when you turn on the lights... Where did all that time and effort go? Can you ever get it back?

My Hard Drives say the Darndest Things

2006-06-09T05:46:38Z

Seriously: I name them. It all started with Tao (my first "Big" Drive, at 300 GB, which is currently my working drive. It can't quite fit all my sound effects an music anymore) and went from there to Aegis (my backup drive... get it?). Most recently I got a .5 GB Flash Drive for the express purpose of moving sound files between Mac and Windows computers, and named that little beaut Babelfish. Complete with Thumb Logo icon.

But today, I have a new working drive, weighing in at 500 GB - more than enough for every music and SFX file I have at the moment (let's check back in at the end of the summer.) It's an occasion, as this will theoretically be the well-engineered levee that holds back the mississippi of music that is my mp3 collection. I have tried to patch this thing with no less than six hard drives, all currently on my desk, all working hard either accessing data or acting as a 100% backup in case of catastrophe.

I needed a fitting name for the Big Drive (that's LaCie's name for it, the clever people), because these things really do have an influence on the work that I do. Honest to God. I thought about Loki for a while, but it strikes me as a huge problem to name a hard drive that you depend on after a god of Mischief and Chaos. Then I thought about how I love harps these days, and how great would it be to name it after someone who was a fan of harp music, say, Eurydice.

It's also a poor plan to name your new hard drive after anyone you have to rescue from the underworld after they die suddenly, only to die again forever just before you recover them, because you just had to see if you could copy that one file before the defragging was complete...

After my last post, I can finally say with confidence that I found the right answer:

Mnemosyne

The Face of God

2006-06-07T01:09:31Z

We got the schedule for Cherubs today (several weeks earlier than usual, go Marni and Matt!) and I just put it in to my calendar.

You have to understand - the Cherubs schedule is a thing of beauty. Getting it and looking it over for the third and fourth time is very akin to the feeling I imagine Harry Potter to get as he gets his class schedule at Hogwarts - each day brings back intoxicatingly fierce memories of evenings spent teching shows in empty spaces, beers consumed with the most talented people I know, all of us completely wracked with fatigue and inspiration, memories of cherubs who take charge and bring the shows from your tired, hopeful hands and make all that happen.

Tonight, I remember the first time I felt that I had talent - it's a feeling I get only after working through the tons of internal resistance I build up over the course of a year. That resistance is toasted at the end of the week of designer runs, the night before we train the crews, and we must program the first two shows of ten in the only hours the theater is available to us - 10 - 3 am.

Sitting in an empty theater, you start to feel very strange things as you conjure worlds of sound and light, your only company the other designer and the ghost of the air conditioning. You are delirious, and there is no time for your own excuses. You have only this time to make the show happen. Demons and Angels are around every corner, in the wings, in the catwalks, in the grid, in the booth. They are there to trap you and propel you forward. Loki and Hades rule here, it is up to you to conjure light from Odin and Zeus.

A cliff, a view opens up in front of you. You can see heaven and hell, in the same sheer face of rock. And with each show, you choose to climb, fly, or fall.

It doesn't matter how you choose to reach the other side. The story is in the trying, the fearlessness of desperation, the knowledge that even if you burn up in the reentry to the world, there are 160 kids two buildings down who will never forget the choices you make, who you will inspire to make the leap themselves.

And then tomorrow, you do it all again. For three weeks.

If you're at all uncertain of your abilities as an artist, this fear is what you need. This responsibility will carry you through as you carry it.

This is why I love my July calendar.

Linebacking for a Playwright

2006-05-24T20:27:23Z

A Note to My Friend, who will most likely never read this:

There is a reason it is called a thesis defense. Your ideas are under attack. The question is, will you acknowledge the perceived weaknesses of your work and adapt to make it stronger, or fall back and do whatever your advisor tells you, cutting, slashing and burning until there is nothing left? Could it be that at this level, perhaps the question is not whether you will do what they tell you to do, but whether you will do what is right for the work no matter what they tell you to do? Perhaps the question of your doctorate is not the strength of your work, but the strength of your character to defend and improve your work through adversity.

Perhaps this is just wishful thinking on my part about the process of defending your thesis. I do know for a fact, however, that when you try to move this project beyond your graduation, these problems will not go away - they'll become other problems until you learn to forge a play through the stress of your life, instead of tabling your wishes and dreams. Treat your work like you won't have a second chance.

Colbert Speaks to the Prez

2006-05-04T05:41:14Z

"Everybody asks for personnel changes. So the White House has personnel changes. Then you write, "Oh, they're just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic." First of all, that is a terrible metaphor. This administration is not sinking. This administration is soaring. If anything, they are rearranging the deck chairs on the Hindenburg!"

Full transcript here, cuz sure, you haven't already read it.

I have an announcement to make!

2006-05-03T18:52:04Z

Can you guess what almost ISN'T in this picture?

IF I was a Superhero ?!?!?

2006-04-21T01:28:27Z

If I was a superhero, 911939 would write a play about me. Okay, I'd only be a walk on. But an IMPORTANT walk on, dammit.

Your results:
You are Green Lantern

Green Lantern

Hot-headed. You have strong
will power and a good imagination.

Click here to take the Superhero Personality Test

horoscopia

2006-04-15T20:43:44Z
My horoscope for the day -
If work were a camping trip, you'd be in charge of the grill. Why? For one thing, everyone trusts you when it comes to handling fire. You can light it, you can keep it burning, you can make sure it doesn't get too big. Further, people trust you to distribute the hot dogs fairly and equitably - and fully cooked. Yup, it's no wonder you're the [theater] equivalent of the grill chef - who else is as trustworthy as you?
Matches the day so well. You're welcome, Raven and TSP.

Calendars, Email, and Memory

2006-04-14T04:06:47Z
So I've gone through, god, 14,000 different gadgets and promises to track my memories and thoughts better. I don't know why I bother. Every time I need to remember something, it's all in one of three places - my calendar (iCal, which among other things, taunts me daily), my email archive (NOT my inbox. I try to keep my inbox as empty as possible lest I really get buried.) or, now, my to do list archive (which is based on Kinkless, an implementation of the Getting Things Done system. More info on kinkless.com)
It turns out that not organizing my thoughts really pays off in terms of being able to find them later. I recently de-organized my mail archives (sorted by production before 2005) and dumped them back in a communal mailbox when I got the new compy that could handle that sort of overhead. Now everything is a) on my computer, so it's searchable (Macs come with a google-for-the-hard-drive feature called spotlight that searches within mail and files for keywords, so it becomes sort of a one-stop-shop for searching. It has never failed that a contrived scheme to organize more or collect more has ended up making it harder to find information or recall memories later on.
So I'm embracing the chaos. I no longer fear that I will lose anything, or my ability to remember something, as long as I keep this box backed up, which I do. I'm beginning to accept the fact that I will always be the least interesting blogger that I read, and will be criminally negligent in any diary or journal I try to apply to my life. The fact is, I resist the rehash of my day, because the thoughts and the creativity are going into all these projects, and that's as it should be. I do need more time to play, but I shouldn't feel compelled to use my play time to blog, or journal, or be productively creative. Play time is just to recenter. Things I can't do under the influence of my brain. My evil brain who schedules me into 105 consecutive days of work.
God, what a jerk. Now: Food and the Office. Wheee!

92 days, or, the Death of a Freelancer by Inches

2006-04-14T03:42:51Z
Call it morbid Curiosity. Call it a cry for help.
For some reason, I got myself really worked up over something TRay told me the other day, that she takes one day off a week, and does nothing during that day. I was incensed, crazed. Snippy. Couldn't tell you why. People need their time off.
Today, in a fit of pique, I went back to find the last 24 hour, calendar day that I had "off". I'm defining "off" here as any period where one does not leave one's house for the purpose of work-related activities. Sound reasonable? Well, it's not in my case. I often conduct work at home, but for the purposes of this exercise I wanted to examine the days where I had no external obligations, where I had to shape my day somehow based on where I needed to be for someone's benefit other than my own.
Last time I had one of these magical days "off?" January 16, ladies and gentlemen. 92 days. A little over 13 weeks. No wonder I don't have any inclination to run a marathon, I'm running one right now.
Now, the vacation has been put in action here, so the end is in sight. When all is said and done, I will break the 100 day (quarter year!) mark. 105 days to be specific. I'll have a couple very light weeks in a row and three days where I actually break the cord and leave the city.
So if you were thinking about calling me to do something outside of my house on Wed, April 26, sorry, I have important plans that day to watch the three netflix movies that have been sitting on my TV for the past, oh, 92 days.

Print me a new brain for the President

2006-04-13T23:59:41Z
Wow. It was only a matter of time, I suppose.

Birthday Meme

2006-04-09T18:31:21Z
On December 27th...
537 A.D. - The Hagia Sophia was completed, scoring one for gargantuanly convoluted projects everywhere.
1831 - Darwin boards the Beagle on his way to the Galapagos. Chilly!
1979 - I am born, and in retaliation the Russians invade Afghanistan.
2001 - China is granted permanent normal trade relations with the U.S.
And a bunch of theater openings, the Abbey and Radio City Music Hall being the biggies. Just in time for New Years
Births
Johannes Kepler (1571)
Marlene Dietrich (1901)
Deaths
Alan Bates (of Gosford Park) - 2003
Max Beckmann (one of the pre-WWII artists that was composited into the Max Rothman character played by John Cusack in Max) - 1950.

And don't it feel good

2006-03-29T00:20:48Z
I'm walking on sunshine. Way-hoo.
Got quite a bit of old junky stuff cluttering my inbox over the past few hours. Including the biggy: Taxes. And about 6 months of filing. I think I finally have this 27 1099s thing worked out. Schedule C is my bitch, and I'm getting quite a refund back.
For a long time, I've had this shakespeare quote in my wallet (right where I never look at it): "that we would do, we should do when we would."

When Local Politics Calls

2006-03-23T03:10:25Z
Well, we tried. Forrest Claypool has conceded in the Democratic Primary (like any other election matters in Chicago) to Machine-boss and as of last week severe stroke-victim John Stroger. Never in my life have I seen a sadder election. Stroger has been Cook County Board President for many years, has pretty much ran it into the ground. He's in charge of the jails, there have been chronic jail breaks in the last year. He's in charge of the orphanages, conditions are deplorable. Stroger has seemed overwhelmed the entire time... Spending thousands in marketing, but never offering more than blubbering whining that his job is tough. Sure his job is tough, but there comes a point where the dysfunctional machine needs to be brought into the shop.
So it was a nasty campaign, Claypool bringing a lot to the table in terms of public strategy for solving the problem, and also bringing a track record for doing more or less the same thing for the park district. Claypool has become the local poster boy of a long-overdue campaign of independant (i.e. not machine-motivated) democrats in Chicago, the national face being Obama, of course. Stroger, a black man from the south side, played the race card pretty heavily, despite being the guy who DIDN'T support Harold Washington's near revolutionary and ultimately successful mayoral bid against the democratic machine in the seventies (Stroger went to bat for Richard M. Daley instead... and Daley went to bat this time around for BOTH Stroger and Claypool, to give a clear example of the no-confidence that Stroger inspires.
then Stroger had a stroke last week. Debilitating, doctors say he will never be the same and will most likely be unable to fulfill the duties of office. Claypool backed off a bit, focusing on the positive endorsements he had received. The most scary thing happened: The machine kept running without a poster child. The machine could not afford to have Claypool elected, so they ramped UP their campaign with Stroger in a near-coma condition. His family made statements along the lines of "John will be sitting this week out, but if the campaign needs to continue, that's what he'd want."
And despite a very closely contested election and threats of vote tampering last night, Stroger's campaign pulled it off with 52% of the vote, and a very angry south side some of whom openly accused Claypool's supporters of racism. Because Claypool is white, apparently.
I give this city four more years before the democratic machine finally realizes that it is so dysfunctional that progressive democrats are actually voting REPUBLICAN in local elections to get the bums out. I know I'm considering it. Big time.

So Much for that Credit Card

2006-03-17T20:20:13Z
I just ordered a new shiny Macbook Pro. $3090 later...
It should be in my hands in a couple weeks. And then Marni and I will both not see each other for another two or so. ;-)

Art or Life?

2006-03-03T23:38:52Z
Sigh of Relief.
I think I'm still doing this for all the right reasons. Perhaps I should reflect for a week or so. Yes, that's it.
Did Laundry today and Dishes yesterday. Both felt GOOOOOOOOD.

Flow

2006-02-12T01:51:19Z
Great Post in 43 folders today on flow, of which I have very little of late. It's all getting there (and on time, no less!) but I haven't had flex time to do those important projects that have been backburnered.
In any case, this quote really resonated today for some reason:
Of the eight elements, one in particular emerged as the most telling aspect of optimal experience: the merging of action and awareness. In Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence sounded a similar theme, when he wrote that “happiness is absorption.” As the thirteen-century Zen master Dogen pointed out, in those moments when the world is experienced with the whole of one’s body and mind, the senses are joined, the self is opened, and life discloses an intrinsic richness and joy in being. For Csikszentmihalyi, this complex harmony of a unified consciousness is the mode of being toward which our own deepest inclination always points us.