video for bat for lashes' song "daniel"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00ZHah-c0hQ

quote of the day, from the film The NeverEnding Story, based on the novel by Michael Ende

Bastian's father - Son, I think it's time you and I had a little talk. I got a call from your math teacher yesterday. She says that you were drawing horses in your math book.
Bastian - Unicorns. They were unicorns.
Bastian's father - What?
Bastian - Nothing.
Bastian's father - She also says that you haven't been turning in your homework on time. And I'm very disappointed that you didn't even try out for the swimming team. As to those riding lessons you wanted, you say you love horses and yet you seem to be afraid to get on a real one. Now Bastian, you're old enough to get your head down out of the clouds, and start keeping both feet on the ground, right?
Bastian - Okay.
Bastian's father - Stop daydreaming. Start facing your problems, okay?
Bastian - Okay.
Bastian's father - Okay.

*Well, if you're of sound mind, you know what Bastian ended up doing, and how.

Pimping & Pumping Jesus (a very sacrilegious blog post....or not)

You've been warned. This might be really offensive to some of you!!!! But it's funny to me, so there:)

On Saturday, Glenn and I drove up to Long Beach so I could meet Jake the Alligator Man, and so the two of them could get reacquainted. We had a wonderful time saying hi to Jake, making fun of all the cheesy/touristy shops (i.e. ones that sell sweatshirts with airbrushed wolves howling at the moon and dreamcatchers hanging in the background, or airbrushed unicorns dashing by waterfalls with rainbows hovering above). Glenn antique-shopped, and I book-shopped (love the couple at Banana Books there!), and we both walked away with Jake bumper stickers; mine says, "I Brake for Jake the Alligator Man."

Here's where you can catch up on Jake, if you two aren't friends already:
http://www.marshsfreemuseum.com/pages/jake.html
http://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/2973
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jake_the_Alligator_Man
***And I just found out -- Jake the Alligator Man's birthday is the same as my brother Jordan's! August 8th....

It was such a lovely day on Saturday....perfect weather....perfect company....great conversation and great Mexican food....On our way out of Long Beach, we stopped at a closed/abandoned fueling station with a gas pump and a few tanks, all covered in rust, weeds clawing all over the place. We noticed everything had been painted in an....interesting way.

First, here's the sign that explains everything:

Notice how this was dedicated on Tori Amos's birthday? What's with all these birthday connections?!

Now, here are some shots of the "murals":





Now here are some shots of the backside of the tanks. See that creepy, rusted bicycle? It just needs a doll with a cracked face, a stray mitten, and maybe an unlaced, dirtied tennis shoe to complete the Full Creepy Effect.



Now, I was pretty creeped out and freaked out by all this (and very entertained, as well). What? You took it upon yourself to paint religious images all over an abandoned gas station? Are Glenn and I the only ones who find this....WEIRD? Had we just walked into the next David Lynch film? I mean, I actually found these to be anti-religious -- grotesque and hideous and downright unsettling (wait, maybe they ARE religious, in some organized and oppressive kinds of ways....). So I had to make fun of them. Glenn and I were up to the challenge. We figured if these folks decided to Pimp Jesus, we could certainly spin our take on Pumping Jesus. Thus:



Okay, if I believed in Hell, I'd probably be going there after this! But I figure I already have the cards stacked against me, so what's one more pumping station (of the cross)?

Three quotes of the day, from Margaret Atwood's The Blind Assassin

"How could I have been so ignorant?...So stupid, so unseeing, so given over to carelessness. But without such ignorance, such carelessness, how could we live? If you knew what was going to happen, if you knew everything that was going to happen next -- if you knew in advance the consequences of your own actions -- you'd be doomed. You'd be as ruined as God. You'd be a stone. You'd never eat or drink or laugh or get out of bed in the morning. You'd never love anyone, ever again. You'd never dare to."

"Happiness is a garden walled with glass: there's no way in or out. In Paradise there are no stories, because there are no journeys. It's loss and regret and misery and yearning that drive the story forward, along its twisted road."

"I must admit I have a daydream about you."

quote of the day

“At the deepest level, there is no giver, no gift, and no recipient…only the universe rearranging itself.”

--Jon Kabat-Zinn, from Wherever You Go, There You Are

quote of the day

“I wanted to really investigate how we’re controlled by the threat of despair...I wanted to look at power -– how we think and how you can reclaim the right to think for yourself, to uncover what you believe in as a spiritual, sexual creature. You don’t need the approval of your family, or of their religion. You can think, ‘Wait a minute, I’m a spiritual being. Just because I like gold handcuffs doesn’t mean I’m not a spiritual being. These definitions are not for my mother to make about me.’ What I am exploring with this record is power, and giving it away with your thinking. How do we become controlled?”

--Tori Amos, while discussing her new album Abnormally Attracted to Sin

quote & mood of the day

"I will permit no man to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him."
--Booker T. Washington