Quote of the Day

"Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence."
- Robert Frost

Fireside red

Went to Fireside red tonight (note the intentional small "r") ... darling of multiple Source (J. Rice) reviews of glowing magnitude.  And it really wasn't that great.  Everything about the production ... from the decor to the menu/marketing to the food just seemed ... amateurish.  Lacking in real attention to detail.  All the food was bland and boring and expensive ... the staff was overly eager and attentive ... and it was all just pretty lame.  Nice deck though ... if you don't mind hanging out with tons of douchy Butte/Old Mill types wearing gold jewelry and Hawaiian shirts and eating overpriced Sysco food.

Quirky Al Fresco Theatre Action

Hi all ... sorry for the super late notice on this ... but if you haven't heard ... we're helpin' the Sparrow Bakery crew put on a super nice al fresco cinema get together this Thursday the 26th at 8PM at the bakery. 50 SE Scott ... as Colorado (heading east) turns the corner and becomes Scott ...

Outdoor movie ... old fashioned homemade concessions by the Sparrow (who make some of the best food ever if you hadn't heard) and Erica doing beverages. Just a nice bite of offbeat good times to start off your weekend. :)  And the bakery is curing some of their own meats and making some really great homemade stuff.  Here is the official writeup from Whitney:

Culinary Cinema @ The Sparrow Bakery

The Sparrow Bakery would like to announce a summer long, open air film series to take place at the bakery on the last Thursday of each month, June, July, and August. The films will each have a culinary theme and include two recently released documentaries and one classic drama. The event will be free, family friendly, and more of a “sit-in” then a “drive-in” - moviegoers will be asked to bring their own chair in an effort to keep the event low budget. There will be old-fashioned concessions and non-alcoholic hand made ginger ale provided for sale by The Sparrow, and beer, wine, and cocktails provided for sale by Plum. The overarching purpose of this series is twofold: 1) To give thanks for continued support despite tightened budgets, the Sparrow would like to offer a free community event to help families, friends, and neighbors enjoy the summer without breaking bank. Moviegoers will be asked to bring their own chairs and blankets, and to remain relatively good-humored about the “rustic” nature of our theater, but otherwise the movies are our gift of respite. 2). The second intention behind the event is to introduce a new Bend campaign to support local business. “Make Local Habit” is an organization of local business owners encouraging the Bend community to make their purchases with locally owned and operated, independent small businesses. During a recession it is most important to remember that small businesses give a town its identity; buying local keeps money in the local economy and reduces gas miles needed to deliver product. Buying local is a win win win. So our film series is essentially a gift to the community and in return we simply ask that they make efforts, big and small, to support the local economy. It should be a kick.

Culinary Cinema @ The Sparrow Bakery

June 26 – I Like Killing Flies (A Documentary about a Chef in Greenwich Village)
July 31 – Big Night (A Drama about an Italian Chef)
August 28 – How to Cook Your Life (A Documentary about a Buddhist Chef)

Cocktails & snacks @ 8pm
Shows begins @ 8:45pm

Bring your own chair!  (camp chair suggested)

Pollen on Environmentalism

interview with Michael Pollen ... from e360, a new environmental journal published by Yale University and edited by Roger Cohn former editor of Mother Jones and Audubon.  Good stuff.

http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2031

Yuck, with a Silver Lining, with a YUCK Lining

So ... as some of you may know ... my car got broken into recently ... and my backpack grabbed ... that included my computer.  Which ... as all of you probably can imagine, sucked.  Months of work ... months of DJ work and tons of personal information and collections of art and music and bookmarks and emails and to-do lists and the whole shot.  A lot of stuff that's super important to me.  Plus, my shades and camera and headphones and so forth.  Needless to say I was pretty sick to my stomach.  It was super lame, and totally made me bitter and suspicious of every person on the street and kinda changed my view of everyday life around here.  Ruined my week quite nicely.  It's amazing how fast you become a raving Republican when you're a victim of a crime.

The police were unfeeling but ... efficient.  They seemed more interested in just filling out forms rather than chasing down leads.  I had no hope.  One website about laptop theft said that 98% of stolen laptops are never recovered.

But ... incredibly ... the other day, I get a call from the investigating officer saying that they recovered my stuff ... and to come down and pick it up at the station.  I was FLOORED.  I was even more floored when I went down there and there was a plastic bag containing almost everything that was in my backpack.  From my laptop to my mouse and sound card, headphones, and even little audio connectors and a USB flash drive.  I was crazy elated and profusely thanked the universe for such fortune (if you can consider it that).  I really couldn't believe it.  I was so happy.  I mean, when does that ever happen that you get your stuff back??!

But there was a yucky lining to the silver lining.  

I get it all home ... and plug it all in ... and it all has this ... fucking ... SMELL.  That stale cigarette and white trash rental apartment smell.  YUCK.  Like, I can fucking smell it right now while I'm typing this.  And consider how nasty the place must've smelled to make a metal computer smell up my room.

EWWW!!!

And it gets worse.  All the stickers on my laptop are removed (years worth).  I open it up, and my desktop image is now some motorcycle picture.  I open iTunes and all my music is gone.  Replaced by a handfull of crappy country music MP3s (the horror!).  I'm starting to feel more violated than I did before I was returned my stuff.  The smell is making me sick ... and I open the browser ... shudder ... and open the history tab.  Can u guess what this wonderful person was using my computer for?  Yep.  Porn.  Porn porn porn.  Dozens of porn Google searches (the screen scrolled for a *long* time) ... including some disturbing search terms I won't repeat ... followed by Craigslist "chance meeting" personals ... and job and housing postings.  Some wierd Google map searches on an address in Seaside, Oregon ... and lots of Craigslist searches for free shit and 70s VW bug listings.  And then it gets even wierder.

Searches for sex offender registries in Utah and Oregon and nationally.  Inmate rosters for various jails in Utah and Oregon.  I'm officially fucking sick to my stomach and I can still smell the cigarettes.  I delete the country music and consider just whiping the entire hard drive in general and start questioning whether I'm happy to have my stuff back at all.  And then I look at the camera sitting on my desk.  Jesus, no ... 

Yes.  

Self fucking portrait ... 

This is the face of yuck in your community.  Undoubtedly taken for a Craigslist personal ad.  There's also numerous photos of some poor kids, including a couple of a little girl wearing my shades and some similarly scary characters.

By now I'm seriously grossed out.  They made my computer ... gross.  I almost don't even want it back.  YUCK!!!!!  Yuck yuck YUCK!!!

:: SHUDDER ::

So I erase everything.  Change my desktop picture to a beach scene ... get out the Lysol, erase the camera and hope to soon forget the entire experience.  I still don't know how the police managed to make the arrest (note about criminals ... most of them are deadly stupid), but Mr. Charming was likely on parole and hopefully will be doing some time for this.  The browser history shows no email website accessed, and nothing else is touched, so I'm not worried that this person used any computer skills to get anything off my laptop.  I had my stuff backed up (learn that lesson right now) ... so I didn't lose anything.

Verdict:  porn obsessed chain smoking white trash drifter crackhead sex offender borrows your laptop for a week.  Fucking GREAT!!

Yeah.  You know ... I usually have a policy ... if something yucky happens to you ... to not really share it ... so you can keep that experience from infecting other people needlessly ... but please allow me to break that rule this time.

YUCK!

Obama

So ... we went to see Obama speak when he was in Bend ... thanks to Erica's endless connections ... we were able to slide in (sadly in front of people who were clearly more fired up than I was) and get a nice seat.

Definitely an EVENT for Bend, you know? National politics center stage at Summit High School. CNN trucks all around. Secret Service guys ... the whole deal. Definitely gave me the chills when he took the stage to a standing ovation (one of six). The Source ran a cool article this week about it that u should check out: http://www.tsweekly.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2822&Itemid=66

What did I think? Mmmm ... the guy is definitely a smart dude. Smart, committed, focused, eloquent, charismatic and definitely inspirational. For a politician. I mean ... he's for sure like twice as cool and twice as interesting and sharp than your typical politician ... and that was a breath of fresh air. Did I smell the stink of politics about? For sure. I mean, yeah. But at least it was like ... mostly substance and a lot less spin. Really refreshing. Very stoked to see this happening and for the promise of a better future. His rhetoric was inspirational as well as being focused. I don't at all agree that he's just "a good speech" (though it does take a good speech to move people). He was super nuts and bolts and proposals and plans. He's very anti-war and pro diplomacy and communication and very international in his focus.

He's also very honorable. He had good things to say about Hillary and McCain ... honoring them for their contributions but remaining steadfast that he thinks his approach is best. He's very anti-division ... instead opting for a lot of talk about unity and so forth, which is really really nice. Importantly ... this being a bi-partisan country ... I feel like he can get more done in a bi-partisan environment than Clinton ... she's just a bulldog and tends to make a lot more enemies. I feel like her reputation is mad tarnished at this point even with the Democrats after running a disturbingly negative and racial campaign and the Republicans definitely don't like her either. She gives me the friggin' creeps, personally. Zero sincerity, all spin and politics and negativity.

:: shudder ::

Speaking of race ... it's just really fucking annoying to realize that we as a nation have completely failed to transcend race. Have u been following the results in West Virginia?? Oh my god! Hillary bolstered on the backs of racists. That's great! I can't believe we're still talking about race. We've gone from slavery to segregation to civil rights to affirmative action and yet, as of 2000 fucking 8 we're still not past talking about the color of someone's skin. It's crazy. What the FUCK?! ((Especially considering that Obama is bi-racial ... his mother and primary parent through his life is white (his father left and went back to Kenya when he was 2 and didn't see Barak again really)).

Barak Obama is an *American* just like everyone else. He's a self-made man who has spent years and years of his life working for the betterment of this country, which is a *lot* more than you can say about most people. Graduated with honors from Columbia, and Harvard ... distinguished years as a community organizer and Senator. Exactly *what* is there to say? People need to look at the man for his life and his accomplishments and his approach to the job at hand and quit talking about the color of his skin. It's fucking OBNOXIOUS. His credentials are as impressive as they are impeccable ... his approach is fresh and inspirational and there's still a ton of people who can't get on board because of the color of (half of) his skin. Makes me want to fucking scream.

ANYWAY, really cool to see the rally go down in Bend. I was impressed with the guy. He spoke clearly and easily from the hip and is clearly very bright and very fired up. And over the course of his hour long speech, he didn't really make me roll my eyes at all, which is saying something. He consistently had the right answers (in my opinion) and wasn't afraid to stand behind them. Twas pretty cool.

Check the video of it on YouTube. Nice to see new things happening in mainstream politics. I mean ... I'm not turning in my Green Party card yet, but it's still nice to see some cool shit happening in the dog and pony show. Now if Hillary would just make herself scarce.

.

Cali Style

Now that I think about it ... I've basically never been to the Napa Valley. I've driven past it and around it to the left of it (101) and right of it (I-80) many times but never really been to Napa or Sonoma. You hear the names, you see the coffee table books ... but for some reason I've never made it over here. And I've been missing out.

Sonoma is pretty much the most picture perfect idyllic amazing little place you could imagine. We rolled in at sunrise after a random adventure partying in Dunsmuir for the evening ... and this place is just heartbreakingly beautiful. Lovingly constructed and kept and with the most pleasant climate and rolling hills and vinyards. Like ... it's just painfully beautiful and chilled out and just ... stunning. I would be happy to work at freakin' IHOP if I could live here.



I was thinking that in retrospect it seemed kind of odd to have spent my winter exploring a continent so far away when I've nary spent time exploring my own back yard. There's tons of places in Oregon, Washington and Northern California that I've never seen or really experienced and it's every bit as cool. Certainly not as cheap as rolling in South America, but ... whatever. I remember when we were visiting the wine region in Argentina ... and people were asking if I was excited to see some vinyards and wineries and I was like ... you know, I've never seen any wineries (except Tim&Cam's) in Oregon, much less the famous Napa Valley.

(I skipped the wineries in favor of the pool, btw)

Certainly there's a lot to be learned and experienced about other cultures and languages and far away places, but ... to a degree people are people and their similarities are many. And I thought it odd that I was trekking around the other side of the globe when I've not really spent time in places like Tahoe ... which would be kind of the equivalent of what we were seeing in Argentina. And it's $100 in gas to get here in a car vs. $2400 in plane tickets (and a lot of fossil fuels) for two.

Dunno. Certainly I don't regret getting to see South America, but this planet is so immense and so fascinating that you have to realize there's a lot of stuff closer to home to experience. Made me think about what the bias is for foreign travel vs. domestic explorations.

One of these days I'm gonna jump in my bus and come down here and spend a couple months just kicking around Northern California.

So yeah, we're in Sebastapol ... which is west of Napa on the other side of Santa Rosa, between the 101 and the coast. Just north of San Francisco. Sonoma County. Leia and Jeffrey and Sahalie have the cutest little cottage tucked away up an old winding street in the middle of Sebastapol. The grounds are crazy beautiful and the yard is out of Sunset magazine. The quality of life here and the vibe is boggling my mind. So beautiful and chill and just ... lovely. Everyone has gardens and farm plots and cute little cottages and the trees are rich and healthy and the flowers are everywhere. Folks have it made here. Leia's house chirps with the songs of parakeets and kids playing outside and it's almost comical how beautiful it is.



Certainly, this all comes with a serious price tag. For sure. Housing is probably twice as expensive as Bend but you wonder what better thing to spend your money on. And not that Bend isn't beautiful ... it certainly is as well.

Erica and Leia and Sahalie are off to a bellydance conference/summit/party and I'm catching up on some quiet time. If we can tear ourselves away from here we'll be headed down the 101 tomorrow or so. Hope everyone's well.

Cali Bound

Ever your intrepid scouts, we're headed south for a couple weeks to peep out the Lightning in a Bottle (lightninginabottle.org) festival ... central coast CA. It'll be good to see the California again. The festival looks amazing. Plus a visit to LA and maybe San Diego and rolling through the Bay Area on the way back. Stoked to be rolling w/ a tight Bend posse for the festival and picking up Mr. Go Time and No One Funna along the way. Also looking forward to some culinary adventures in SF and hooking up w/ Surly folk and visiting the Leia-Jeffrey compound in Sebastopol. Now if the temps would just drop below 100 it'll all be gooten!

Updated Mix

Some people bugged me that the mix I posted was too short.  So ... I delved back in and worked it up to 60 minutes.  How's that for customer service.

www.thegrove411.net/FileSpace/Music

It's called "Diaspora" 

Cover Art:  www.thegrove411.net/FileSpace/DiasporaCoverWeb.jpg

enjoy

C.

ps.  If you'd like a numbered, limited edition handmade hard copy, Paypal me $10 to "lohrey@agora.rdrop.com" and I'll send ya one. 

pps.  Thanks to Jason and Mike for inspiration, big up!

Paaartyyy!

Basically ... we should all be rallying out into the woods and setting up a sound system and rocking out ... a lot more often.  That's word.

Bacon and pepper-American cheese product on a bagel.  We call it the "Bagelsone".

Separated at birth?

Character.

Sunrise

Impossible to get a shot of Tyler that's not blurry.