ah, joni...

happy holidays

hallelujah

Christmas music all day long please

oh yeah, it's eric clapton

heard this at a restaurant last night and couldn't remember who it was

moon water

     So remember the NASA expedition to crash into the moon and kick up some dust? Well, as stated by the Associated Press article, that dust is "making lunar exploration exciting again."
     One of the scientists excited reported: "We found water. And we didn't find just a little bit. We found a significant amount." And then he held up a white bucket for emphasis.
     There are so many things about this that are just great. 

the buddha

Remember the story of the Buddha sitting under the bodhi tree? 

"In traditional versions of the story, it’s said that no matter what appeared, whether it was demons or soldiers with weapons or alluring women, he had no reaction to it at all.  I’ve always thought, however, that perhaps the Buddha did experience emotions during that long night, but recognized them as simply dynamic energy moving through.  The feelings and sensations came up and passed away, came up and passed away.  They didn’t set off a chain reaction.

This process is often depicted in paintings as weapons transforming into flowers – warriors shooting thousands of flaming arrows at the Buddha as he sits under the bodhi tree but the arrows becoming blossoms."
        --Pema Chodrin


arrows into blossoms

the sneezing baby panda

hehehe

thanks angela

Musical Intimacy.

Check it out.

right away, great captain

the story behind this artist isn't anything new... it's a side project born out of the end of a relationship... but it is so sad and brutal and honest. 
i love it.

my best brownie recipe

Bittersweet Brownies   these are not very sweet but they are delicious! 

1 c unsweetened applesauce
1/3 c raw sugar
1 t vanilla
3/4 c wheat flour
1/3 c black cocoa powder
2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
1/4 t cinnamon
1/2 c bittersweet chocolate chips

Mix the wet. Mix the dry. Mix the wet with the dry until just combined and fold in chocolate chips. Bake @ 350˚ for 20 min.

bed

put me in it

t-pain, obama, and health care...

this is the funniest thing i've seen in awhile...

a.a. bondy

new album will floor you

Phoenix

weirdy looking french band all loveliness...

Passions of the Brain

Another great NPR story..."According to new neuroscience studies, emotion has a strong influence on how the human brain makes decisions."

Listen (or read) here

Also, Radiolab's Stochasticity ("which is just a wonderfully slippery and smarty-pants word for randomness") segment is INCREDIBLE

Listen here

miike snow #2

This is the same song that i posted last month... but a different video!

ryan adams

i've always liked ryan adams, but never infatuated. however a good friend insists that i spend some more time with him and i'll admit... he's growing on me. this song is lovely (and the accompanying picture is priceless...)

REM cover

joshua james (love) did a cover of "losing my religion" for daytrotter. it's fantastic!

go download it (and everything else)

the sexes

sometimes to help my students understand writing assignments i will do the assignment with them and show them what i've done as a sort of model. today we chose a broad topic together, relationships between the sexes, and brainstormed possible directions for research-broadened personal essays. This is the rough fastwrite that i did and showed my class. i'm thinking about expanding it into a real essay...

Men and women think differently. Someone told me once that a woman's mind is like an air-traffic controller. It stands in the middle of a VERY busy airport, with glowing batons and an orange vest, directing all the hundreds of hovering thoughts, emotions, and ideas that circle around and around waiting to land. That same person also told me a man's mind is like a waffle. It can only be in one pocket at a time and just hops from pocket to pocket.

freedom of speech

Richard John Neuhaus:

“In a democracy that is free and robust, an opinion is no more disqualified for being ‘religious’ than for being atheistic, or psychoanalytic, or Marxist, or just plain dumb.”

NYC

group jump shot in DUMBO

jamie and me in Central Park

Stealers Wheel

so sometimes there's something that's been around for YEARS and you had no idea... well, today the song "late again" by stealers wheel entered into my life, and at long last this band is part of my obsessed collection.

Scribendi

Utah State University has a creative writing competition every year called Scribendi.

Go check out last year (ignore the html problems)

Freeze Me, Blast Me, Shatter Me

Don't wanna waste money and land space when you die?

Listen to NPR on "alternative burial"

The Book Thief

It's a book that anyone keen on something different and somewhat astonishing should attempt. The author, Markus Zusak, has put together a remarkable story -- written with emotional detail in such a way that it isn't just another account of Nazi Germany, but a character-driven homage to kindness and cruelty as well as life, death, and books. As put by a NY Times reviewer: "It will be widely read and admired because it tells a story in which books become treasures. And because there's no arguing with a sentiment like that."

Narrated by Death, the tone is ironic yet tender, and very frank -- just like Death himself:

"On many counts, taking a boy like Rudy was robbery-- so much life, so much to live for -- yet somehow, I'm certain he would have loved to see the frightening rubble and the swelling of the sky on the night he passed away. He'd have cried and turned and smiled if only he could have seen the book thief on her hands and knees, next to his decimated body. He'd have been glad to witness her kissing his dusty bomb-hit lips.

Yes, I know it.

In the darkness of my dark-beating hear, I know. He'd have loved it, all right.

You see?

Even death has a heart."

Read the rest of the NY Times review here

My new musical OBSESSION

Thanks to spenny's recommendation to watch this:



i am now totally in love with these sisters and their band "first aid kit"
Gorgeous music video HERE

American Casino

Interested in sub-prime mortgages?

How about how they got us into the recession?

Go find out about the documentary "American Casino"

New Vampire Weekend Song!!

Listen to New Vampire Weekend Song "Horchata"

Shared via AddThis

p.s. her name is kirsten ----->

The global Pool of Money

Ready for an explanation on how the global economy works?

How about an illustrated version?

The global Pool of Money

Posted using ShareThis

Food Inc.

go see it

(Official Trailer here)

NEW Joshua James album

It's amazing. GO BUY IT!

miike snow

an apple a day

I eat an apple every day.

not intentionally... i just can't get any work done when i'm hungry so i bring a snack to my office -- which, because i never have the time or the foresight to do more than grab something as i'm heading out the door, always ends up being an apple. except one time i brought a banana (there were no apples).

this one was just particularly pretty.

MBAR video

loves his voice

every friggin morning

xkcd.com

Miles Benjamin Anthony Robinson

Read the article and Listen to "death by dust"

babies buying babies

Elna Baker is an interesting Mormon comedian who had a story on NPR's This American Life called "Babies Buying Babies" and it is one of the funniest and slightly disturbing segments T.A.L. has done.

Visit her homepage and listen!

White Rabbits

i wasn't too impressed when i saw them in denver

but i haven't been able to stop listening to this...

SSC 337

booja

Why?

Band of the Week: WHY?

Paste Magazine Article

*listen to "this blackest purse"

28 Teeth

Temper Trap

Deer Tick

Deer Tick on Daytrotter

download all of it

listen to Ashamed first

I'm caught in a whirlwind

I'm going to heaven

no lightbulb

i don't think you meant to say it that way

i do think the toes of your words

caught the heel of your intentions

– and while you were able to catch yourself

you lost the anonymity of even measured steps;

habitually cautious and deliberate.

i know i was lucky to catch you stumble;

you and i are too often like two seagulls

squalling back and forth –

really leaning into it.

but today i was listening

and as i drove away,

wheels beating the pavement to a froth,

i heard again

your accident,

candor lending a third dimension

to simple sentences.

and i felt as though i might spill the egg of sun

out of it's careful place

balanced in the concave of a spoon

whose long neck extended

right up to me

in my '93 Buick Century.

do you mean it as a compliment afterall

when you tell me how much we are the same?

i do have your nose,

short legs,

innate pessimism...

so it made sense.

colorcode.com

Congratulations, you are a Blue.

Blues (Motive: Intimacy)

Blues are motivated by Intimacy. They seek to genuinely connect with others, and need to be understood and appreciated. Everything they do is quality-based. They are loyal friends, employers, and employees. Whatever or whomever they commit to is their sole (and soul) focus. They love to serve and give of themselves freely in order to nurture others' lives.

WHAT COLOR ARE YOU? (GO FIND OUT! AND LET ME KNOW!)

The Education of Little Tree

"Granma said when you come on something good, first thing to do is share it with whoever you can find."

Mormon ASL

This is from the LDS ASL sign book, which happens to be an official publication of the church. Which is of course awesome... so let's all learn how to sign fornication -- you know, for all those comments you need to make in deaf church about “sleeping around.” Love it! (not sleeping around -- Mormon ASL)

the double-yolker day

so i found a double yolk in the second egg while making french toast for jamal this morning so i made sure to document this incredible occurrence.

Wikipedia had the following to say about this abnormality:

Some hens will lay double-yolked eggs as the result of unsynchronized production cycles. Although heredity causes some hens to have a higher propensity to lay double-yolked eggs, these occur more frequently as occasional abnormalities in young hens beginning to lay. Usually a double-yolked egg will be longer and thinner than an ordinary single-yolk egg. (i did not notice this) Double-yolked eggs occur rarely, only leading to observed successful hatchlings under human intervention, as the unborn chickens would otherwise fight each other and die. (HOLY CRAP THAT IS AWESOME!)

This of course leads to the inevitable visual image of two unborn chickens fighting to the death inside an otherwise normal looking egg...who knew such an epic struggle was taking place in such a small unknown corner of the world...

assert yoself

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCNIBV87wV4

...may I add "WRITE with authority" to this as well.

Maybe I'm just a dweeby English teacher, but where has the art of rhetoric gone? Where has constructive conflict gone? What has happened to the communal conversation?

Be an active, conscious, and deliberate participant in society and assert yoself

Blues

by Elizabeth Alexander

I am lazy, the laziest
girl in the world. I sleep during
the day when I want to, 'til
my face is creased and swollen,
'til my lips are dry and hot. I
eat as I please: cookies and milk
after lunch, butter and sour cream
on my baked potato, foods that
slothful people eat, that turn
yellow and opaque beneath the skin.
Sometimes come dinnertime Sunday
I am still in my nightgown, the one
with the lace trim listing because
I have not mended it. Many days
I do not exercise, only
consider it, then rub my curdy
belly and lie down. Even
my poems are lazy. I use
syllabics instead of iambs,
prefer slant to the gong of full rhyme,
write briefly while others go
for pages. And yesterday,
for example, I did not work at all!
I got in my car and I drove
to factory outlet stores, purchased
stockings and panties and socks
with my father's money.

To think, in childhood I missed only
one day of school per year. I went
to ballet class four days a week
at four-forty-five and on
Saturdays, beginning always
with plie, ending with curtsy.
To think, I knew only industry,
the industry of my race
and of immigrants, the radio
tuned always to the station
that said, Line up your summer
job months in advance. Work hard
and do not shame your family,
who worked hard to give you what you have.
There is no sin but sloth. Burn
to a wick and keep moving.


I avoided sleep for years,
up at night replaying
evening news stories about
nearby jailbreaks, fat people
who ate fried chicken and woke up
dead. In sleep I am looking
for poems in the shape of open
V's of birds flying in formation,
or open arms saying, I forgive you, all.