wire

ugh. its late. still sculpting. amber too. my hands are blistering from this wire. i gotta just relax- we are doing much too much work here.

anniversary

10 years together! 4 of them we've been married!

how to melt your brain

spend all your time in studio classes. no books, lectures, or reading; just work, work and more (art)work. : ]

School, bike, etc

Well, this week was our first week of school. We have 3 nine hour days. The other 2 days we pretty much are using to work on our art projects for those classes. It's all pretty demanding. We've been pretty rushed the last week and already had to pull one all-nighter to finish a project- mostly because we spent that whole day running around town to different art stores looking for supplies on foot- our car is unusable. We took it for some repairs and were without it all week. Upon its return we learned that the rear tires were concealing some pretty bad wear on the insides. The steel belts were coming through and the tires were separating. Needless to say it's much too dangerous to continue driving, hence all the running around on foot. It would have been nice to have my bike for all this; too bad some asshole had to steal it. I've seen the guy wondering around out back and trying to get into our basement doors to sleep. He steals other peoples' bikes, so I would assume he stole mine. Well he's an asshole and he's aggressive, too, and although I'm not a violent person, I can't have him trying to get in the house. If I see him back there trying to open those doors, I'm gonna kick his ass hard.

Now that all the venting is over, hopefully this next week will be a little more chill. Whew. Our cat misses us. OOh, but I AM getting a new bike this week, and it is new, but I'm going to cover that shiny new paint with a few layers of a vintage matte color. Not only will it look cooler, but also (and more importantly) it will look crappier. This makes it more desirable to me and less desirable to others. I'm keeping it indoors. So fuck off, neon ron.

Anyways, its now tetris and tea time ;)

west virginia

(transferred from a notebook)
on the road again.
yes, it feels good.

we are stopped at a rest area a little ways outside of charleston. we had planned on arriving at the festival early this evening and setting up camp there, but we had some car trouble that caused us delays. lucky for us, it didn't stop us from coming altogether, but the problem is not resolved, so there are some negative possibilities regarding our return to columbus. this is our first return back to west virginia since we left over a year ago. this rest area is a comfort and has welcomed us in with good vibrations all the way from the highway. we considered driving all night, but for some reason, despite all of my nervous energy, it felt right to stop and join our friends in the morning bright and early. there is something about sleeping in the car that feels like home to me (both of us, really). who needs hotels? the car is like a warm fire or going to grandma's house; yes what a comfort.

amber and i had a lot of time to talk on the way down. we expressed a lo of things regarding not only the present situation, but also many other things back home: school, sanctuary, wise men, self defense, the bus book, the perverted taoist, the mentally challenged intellectual nietzsche reader, momma's boys, our van, metaphysical roads, and tarot card readings. we have both learned much from this summers divine agenda, just as we learned much from our springtime. strong connections have been made which will produce fruits of good energy.

Life creates life.

yesterday / next week

there was some kind of weird energy in columbus yesterday. both amber and i felt it. not quite sure what the source was, but it has moved on.

on the lighter side, next week will be a time of great changes. we are planning to revisit our brothers and sisters in wv and and enjoy the festivities at their festival, all of which could not come at a better time; a prelude to a new quarter at school, which starts 2 days later.

lunar eclipse

this morning at 5:30 or so, amber and i got up and went outside to watch the total lunar eclipse. about halfway through, the sun began drawing close to our side of the horizon and it faded, but the reddish beauty against the ink-blue sky was still amazing.

travelers

the other night, two young men appeared around here. evidently, one was from new york and left for california because he said that god told him to. the other was from somewhere in the midwest headed for new york, where he planned to fly to isreal- because god told him to. I guess they just met at the peace rally downtown and connie brought them back here. they both left on the same day and said they were told not to bring anything. they weren't quite sure what it meant that they ran into each other, so they spent the last half of the week at connie's house and around outside. I think connie offered them meals like mac and cheese and such. they hung around talking to everyone and tried to figure out if they were supposed to join up and go somewhere together. one of them seemed very interested in talking with us and made an instant connection. eventually, they decided that they each needed to fulfill their own part of the task or plan, and last night or early this morning, with much emotion all around, they each left on their journeys. so here is to adam and jim. we hope you find happiness and enlightenment on your journeys.

the back-back-forty

our secret garden...

kitchens are cool

There is nothing really quite like hanging out in the kitchen. I feel like this is sort of true no matter where you go. You could have a huge living space, and a closet for a kitchen, and everyone would still want to cram in there.

:)

influences + inspiration

Our cd collection is growing rapidly, and we are really learning a lot. We are spending the summer surrounding ourselves with things and people that are teaching us new things. Plus it kind of feels like Colin Meloy, Wayne Coyne, Meg White, Jimmy Page, and Jim James have kinda been sharing some secrets from afar. We got rid of the cable in June, and I'm kinda glad. Visual endevours have been kinda mystic/trippy lately: Star Wars, Tetris, Almost Famous, anime, Documentaries, 70's and 80's cartoons.

Our back yard is like the new central hub-hangout area for the Victorians folk. There are like 2-10 people out back at any given time. Many of them have a lot of things to say that we could learn from, but even just the experience of hanging out with them is really wonderful.

landlords and recordings

Our favorite neighbor (and green-thumb / earth mother) Connie, is being removed from her apartment because the new owner wants to rent exclusively to med students (and apparently NOT to hippies). Landlords suck. I guess amber and i will have to host the backyard hangout all the time now, and with 1/2 the space. Well, I guess we've got to defend our scene here. Amber bartending at Victorians now is great for that, because she can help initiate things.

Oh, but we jammed into some wicked recordings late last night :) We keep trying to get some good recordings of what we have but every time we try, we end up writing new material and jamming on that all night. Anyways, I know its easy to become anxious, but if its time to write now, then rite we must, and I guess the time will come later to finally go and lay down some nice, clean recordings.

Recently

Saturday afternoon Amber and I went on a photo shoot. We each took some shots. Amber is an amazing photographer. Also later that night had an interesting time at a dinner party. Wine and sparklers are always a good time.

Sunday we wondered around at some antique stores in Clintonville- Also picked up a pretty bad-ass autumn jacket for amber. At the Antique Mall (I know antique mall sounds lame, but it's pretty sweet; it's a century old building filled with retro furniture and vintage clothing from basement to loft - anyways -) we found some Rainbow Bright playing cards printed in 1983 with which we will adorn a wall or something.

I finally laid down a sub-flooring in the basement and soon we'll be able to lay the wood for the floor. We have been carefully gathering vintage furniture, and scrap wood for the bar and stage. It will be completely fantastic... well, it'll be at the least both charming and insane. I can only hope.

Lollapalooza is coming up very shortly, and we are gonna try to come up with the funds to go to it. Luckily, we already have someone's apartment in downtown Chicago to stay at, and we'll probably take the bus, we just need tickets.

Off to a veggie cook out now and later maybe a nice nightly walk around the city and some website work or some recording.

July Third

Amber and I got a gig playing a benefit for (three) tigers and (two) lions. Looking forward to that. Its July third and they're doing the fireworks here in Columbus. I'm sitting at the coffee shop, amber's working behind the counter. I'm working on some art and website stuff in photoshop. It's nice outside; good night for a walk about town. Anyways, nothing else, really.

bonnaroo here we come!

flaming lips are sure to blow everyone away...
were also looking forward to the decemberists quite a bit
shooting with a digital slr this year instead of film so i can get more shots, better shots
plus both of us being photographers now, we'll get a lot of crazy cool stuff.
oh man, its so hot. no a/c in the car- cant wait to get on the road, though.
love to all