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| Last week I completed a painting of Frank Zappa that I began in high school, over thirty years ago. I hung it up in my office along with the acrylic painting of John Lennon and the large watercolor of John Cipollina, both of which were begun about the same time as Frank, but completed in the past few years. This has been a goal of mine for quite some time. I am terrible at finishing things… all kinds of things. So, I thought I would work through some unfinished projects, one by one, and see if I could develop a habit of completing whatever I start. |
Category: <span>Art • Design • Culture</span>
I had another living room epiphany last week. But, before I go on and you get all excited and ask me to come work my interior design magic on your place, remember that I only do this for pleasure… no silver will cross the table.
We looked into putting an insert into our fireplace, but new regulations made it prohibtive, both in cost and efficiency. So, I sat gazing at the center of our living room, the locus of fellowship in our home and thought, “now what?” Should we put a large flower arrangement in front of it? Or, pile up a bunch of candles inside the fireplace, like the hipsters in Rocklin do?… Read the rest
Well, we quit Netflix. I found that I was watching more movies than I normally would, because I wanted to get my money’s worth. My discontent surfaced when I read about the class-action lawsuit filed against them for dragging their feet on fulfilling customers requests, who were signed up for “unlimited” rental accounts. I noticed that my service degraded around that time and their “cycling” became obvious and inconvenient for us.
Anyway, we are spending much less time in front of the tube, which is a real bonus and, now that I know what I’m looking for at the local video store, I can get in and out for about a buck.… Read the rest
That’s the vista or view of Julio Ojeda-Zapata in his review, Vista’s pretty, but it’s a shameless Mac OS X imitator Bottom line. He sums up Windows Vista this way:
Get a Mac with OS X unless your home-computer needs are Windows-specific, or if the fine Media Center is a must for you. You likely won’t regret a Vista-PC purchase, but I’m betting you’ll enjoy a Mac much more.
An amusing tongue-in-cheek video by David Pogue covers the same ground in a more creative fashion. I have to say that I use Windows XP at work and I really don’t mind it that much.… Read the rest
Boy, have we been going ever since we flew into Manchester NH! We’ve been looking at land, while squeezing in visits with friends, whoopie pies, red snappy hot dogs and some haddock, followed by pie at Helen’s! Our friends, the Websters, have been great hosts. I’ve published a few photos here.… Read the rest
Young People Flock To Second-Tier Sites Amid Shifting Tastes
This is welcome news, as far as I’m concerned. I just signed up on Facebook and the interface was noticeably less cluttered and usable. I’m not a huge fan of these new-fangled social networking sites, but from a design perspective things are starting to look up. As I pointed out when Ditty Talk rolled out, the MySpace design is just plain ugly and whenever someone adds a photo or video to their page, it gets pushed all out of shape and the user ends up scrolling in all directions.
These new contenders have some neat features that MySpace lacks:
Among the new social-networking sites is one called XuQa.com,… Read the rest
We immediately replaced the carpet when we bought our house ten years ago — the hardwood (oak) floors underneath were pristeen and beautiful. So, we decided to pull them up some time ago to eliminate the haven for dust mites and provide a beautiful contrast for modern furnishings (which we hope will come later). For now, the floors are beautiful and should be wonderful after they are sanded and refinished. Camille and Sean helped us pull up the old stuff.… Read the rest
Press Release: Christian Music Singer-Songwriter super-group The Lost Dogs to wander in to Roseville.
On Thursday, September 28th, 2006, Valley Springs Presbyterian Church will host an intimate evening with The Lost Dogs at the Underground Café in Roseville. The Lost Dogs are a collaborative singer-songwriting effort that brings together some of the best musicians from the past 30 years of Christian music. It features the skills of Terry Taylor (of the 1970’s Jesus Movement band Daniel Amos), Derri Daugherty (of both the 1980’s alternative music group The Choir and City on a Hill fame), Mike Roe (of the Sacramento-based college radio favorites The 77’s) and Steve Hindalong (also of The Choir and City on a Hill, as well as the writer of the chart topping worship song, “God of Wonders“).… Read the rest
Yesterday, Denise and I took a day trip up above Sierra City. We found this nice spot overlooking the Sierra Buttes from Haskell Peak — I whipped out my PowerBook and fired it up. And… which one of my dozens of random desktop photos do you suppose came up on the monitor? Yep! A shot of the Buttes from the other side, which I took back in 1978! Those are some impressive rocks!
Later, we took a stroll on the Sand Pond Interpretive Nature Trail, which was lovely and then, on a lark, drove home through Sierraville via Highway 89.… Read the rest
I found a blogger’s home away from home at Panera Bread and it’s habit-forming. Denise likes to do her shopping in Rocklin and I like to spend time with Denise, so we drive down, she drops me off at Panera and she does her thing, while I do mine. Then, we usually get a bite to eat at a taqueria or barbecue joint.
Denise and I learned to love Panera when we visited Emma in Chapel Hill. Because it was overcast or raining the entire time we were there and Emma worked all day, Denise and I spent a considerable amount of time in the comfortable environs that are Panera, catching up on email, eBaying, blogging or just chatting over a hot, caffeinated beverage.… Read the rest
Child molestation cases involving Catholic priests have been all over the news since the 1990s, pointing to serious sexual abuse among the clergy of all faiths and denominations. What makes this such a powerful story is the fact that priests had built a solid reputation as trustworthy advocates for children over the years. When someone my age thinks of children and priests, we are immediately reminded of Father Flanagan and Boy’s Town. But, that has all been undone now. A relative few clergy betrayed that trust and robbed so many children of their sexual innocence, plunging the Roman Catholic church into one of the most costly and devastating crises in its entire history.… Read the rest
This past weekend Denise and I enjoyed a concert by the Taipei Philharmonic Chamber Choir and it was lovely (our 30th wedding anniversary, too). What an ecclectic blend of modern western choral/sacred music, spiced up with some Mongolian folk songs, Taiwanese pop music and even an Australian aboriginal chant! It was different than anything we have heard from the Nevada Union Choir, The Boy’s Choir of Harlem or the Choir of the West.
The big draw, however, was Sam’s boyhood friend, Abe Sitzer, who brought the choir to town. We remember Abe as a fun, outgoing kid who loved to clean and organize Sam’s room… seriously!… Read the rest
Today, I received my copy of the new 77s DVD Collection, featuring seven official music videos by my favorite band, The Seventy Sevens, as well as another disk of “live bootleg” concert footage going back to 1982!
It was just like Christmas in July, as Sean and Emma watched me excitedly tearing the cellophane off the case. They were also very understanding and patient as I rushed to the DVD player and cued up the first video, Mercy Mercy, which I had seen years ago. It was just as I remembered it. I was at a number of the featured concerts and, though they were 20 years ago, it was as if I had seen them just yesterday.… Read the rest
The other day at work, I was following my usual routine… performing menial labor, while I listen to talk or opinion on the radio. One of my customers, who would probably consider herself progressive, tolerant and erudite, came to the counter and asked, “how can you listen to so much hate?” I was taken aback and then responded, “man, you should have heard the hate I was listening to this morning driving up here. I had NPR on the radio!” Then, it was her turn to look surprised.
So, I thought it might be a good idea to reflect on what I listen to and why; then blog about it.… Read the rest
Write Fink! has been blogging about old VWs and it conjured up a few memories of — believe it or not — young romance. When I met Denise (she was 17 and I was 18), she had a blue 1966 Volkswagen Beetle much like the one in the photo. Technically, it was Brian, Denise, and Diane’s VW, but when Brian was off to school Denise had seniority and it would eventually be handed down to Diane. My heart still thumps when I think of Denise, long blonde hair blowing through the window, leaning into a turn, cranking the wheel with her left hand, while down-shifting with her right, and depressing the clutch with her Dr.… Read the rest
This weekend, I’m cleaning up all of my eMail SPAM and webforms on my sites. So far, success! The highlight is this anti-SPAM plugin for WordPress that really works. It’s called Did You Pass Math? and requires the commenter to solve a simple arithmetic problem before the comment is submitted. Fortunately, robots aren’t smart enough to know that 2 + 2 equals 4… yet.
Next, I’ll be checking out some spell checkers… The last one I tried didn’t work.… Read the rest
I found a professional writer (or, he found me), who loves John Wayne more than I do (T-Bone Burnett and C.S. Lewis, too) and he’s got a new blog. Check out Write Fink! and then follow his profile to his pro-site. Great stuff!… Read the rest
If you like poetry and if you like free poetry even better, check out The Great Poetry E-Book Free-For-All. You only have 17 hours and 43 min… wait, you only have 17 hours and 42… no, you only have 17 hours and 41 minutes to get there and download all the free poetry your bandwidth will allow!
Thanks for the heads-up Charles! I snagged Shortness of Breath.… Read the rest
I really enjoyed this television movie starring Don Rickles, Keke Palmer, Catherine O’Hara and one of my all-time favorites, William Macy. I believe he won a Golden Globe award for this film. It’s based on Jackie Gleason’s classic, Gigot, and it is a real upbeat PG-13 with some rough language and themes. On the other hand, we trudged through the Monkee’s highly-recommended psychedelic art film, Head. It was dreadful.… Read the rest
Today I checked out the statistics on my sites for the first time since moving to GoDaddy ten months ago. I was pleasantly surprised to find that my Overcoming Necrotizing Fasciitis site had over 1.5 million server requests and 213,000 page hits in less than a year. When the flesh-eating bacteria is in the news, traffic picks up and we average a couple prayer requests a week for someone in the hospital suffering from the disease. Students of all ages contact me for interviews or permission to use the materials on the site for assignments, papers and other class projects at least a couple of times a month.… Read the rest
So, we had this assignment… a perspective drawing using Conte’ crayon and charcoal, combining one-point and two-point perspective. Other requirements were some sort of grid or pattern, vanishing into mountains in the distance, at least one building and an amorphous shape. My first attempt was way too ambitious with tons of figures, shapes and a building with windows and doors. No way. Then, I thought I’d put a rocket on the moon, greeted by blobbish locals, with multiple moons orbiting. Again, too busy. So, I arrived at this abstraction of the axis of evil and their quest for the bomb.… Read the rest
Denise and I vacationed in San Francisco last weekend and it was tons of fun. You can view the paltry few photos we took here. Our original plan was to hit thrift stores all the way down from Nevada City, but that proved disappointing (to put it mildly) and opened us up to an unexpected variety of “divine appointments,” good food and miles upon miles of walking, up and down hills.
Where do I start? Well, we stopped for coffee in El Sobrante and met a wonderful bunch of guys who were out on assignment from a prophecy workshop at a local church, “Hearing From God.”… Read the rest
Well, today I got my old blog completely rolled over into PietyHill Press and have all the posts categorized in the navigation column. I’ll spruce up the blog roll and then track down all my old images and upload them. The next project will be to re-skin this blog… what do you think of a fall colors theme?… Read the rest
It’s been 15 years since I last saw Mike Roe perform with the 77s, my favorite band. Last Monday the Nevada County Chapter of the Mike Roe Fan Club traveled down to Auburn CA to see the Roe vs. Pritzl Winter Tour at the Fishbowl Cafe. The set began with Mike Pritzl of The Violet Burning singing some of the most serious, introspective and spiritual songs I’ve heard in a long time. After about 40 minutes, he introduced Mike Roe sporting a pair of secret agent style sunglasses. Mike sang some new favorites and some old ones, too. His guitar playing was muscular and his vocals were flawless.… Read the rest
Well, I finally got most of the posts from my old blog stripped out, the template has been shaped up and there are now some resources linked in the right column. Last night, 2-7-2006, we spent most of our Bible study talking about hermeneutics or the science of Biblical interpretation and how it relates to the study of Revelation. So, I will be posting to the blog more regularly from here on out.
There are a number of good resources for understanding the book of Revelation. Steve Gregg’s Revelation: Four Views has a helpful introduction for the layman (regular folks like us).… Read the rest