The reviews are in. It looks like the new Star Wars movie sucks. James Lileks review in today’s Star Tribune is simple and to the point. It’s weird, but I think I actually convinced myself that this was going to be a great movie. My faith is shaken. I think I’m less interested in seeing the movie then just reading and listening to people’s reactions. It’s like an entire generation making a religious trek to see Captain Moses. I want to see the faces of the people as they come down off the hill. What did the great one say? Are you enlightened? How are you brother? What IS possible and where to next?

Speaking of what is possible and modern prophets, there is a non-political, straight up historical, what does the future hold, interview with the Ambassador of the Bum Rush – Chuck D over at the Heavy Bronx. Chuck’s really into Napster and file sharing and claims that the new innovators will be programmers not musicians. The current revolution he claims is not the actual music but access and distribution to music. Chuck’s always on top of the game, huh?

Are the Ex-Presidents planning a coup? Jimmy Carter and Clinton sneak around behind King Bush’s back and make foreign policy. Carter dispels the lies coming from his old home – the white house. Go Jimmy!

I still can’t believe that I lost $18 bucks on the Derby. Although, I’m glad I didn’t go with Thompson’s horse.

“I think the only thing you’ll ever see I specialized in is taking good photos”

–Glen E. Friedman

I saw the ridiculously inspiring documentary Dogtown and Z-boys this weekend and walked away with an ever greater admiration for Glen E. Friedman: revolutionary photographer. In conjunction with the dogtown articles written and photographed by C. R. Stecyk, Glen E. Friedman photo work is central to the dynamic execution of this documentary, which features numerous stills taken by Glen. Glen E. Friedman is a huge inspiration. And a vegan He’s doing it right. While others try and copy the skating maneuvers of Tony Alva and Jay Adams, I’m studying Dr. Friedman and readjusting my fish-eye lens, looking for something honest to take a picture of.

His latest book The Idealist is a wonderful departure from his older published work. The A bomb memorial shot is beautiful.

Also I must submit his photo of HR from Bad brains flipping on stage as one of the most crucial photos taken in the last 30 years. Also the one of the motor city mad man is galactic. And cause I can’t get enough: the dog bowl and an interview.

The Newsweek article on Children at War is a very important, albiet very disturbing article to read.

As things heat up here for Wellstone’s reelection bid, the Washington post calls out Norm Colman as G.B.’s little beeatch.

The great ottoman project of 2002 was finally wrapped up this weekend. The woods used were: birch for the paneling, ash for the legs, and redwood for the trim around the side. It was built with storage capacity too. Which you can see in this photo. The fabric, which is some “Waverly” knock-off, I think works very nicely. Next up for the midnight woodworker are some storage cubbies and after that the big summer project! A barbecue center, featuring double old school built-in hibachis. Peep the styles. I got the design out of this sweet 70’s book: “Easy-to-Make Outdoor Furniture”. Contact me if you’d like the the schematics.

Random note: The song “Getting Stronger Everyday” by Chicago, is one powerful anthem. Incredible production. It begins with a huge funk beat with drums that jump off the track, some really dirty guitar, and some preachin’. The song ends in some banging four-on-the-floor craziness that makes you not sure you should be listening to the song in the car. I really miss how drums used to be recorded. All this heavy stuff on the radio today, albeit some of it good, has a watered down sameness when it comes to the sound of the drum. Everything is gated, compressed and sampled, mixed into a low-end stew and lacking a ton of energy.

Free music swapping over the internet is just the tip of the iceberg. I’m ready for software that allows artists to release the individual raw unmixed tracks of a song or an album of which I can then download and mix to my desired audio listening tastes. I’d pay for that.

It doesn’t take much to remind you these days that danger, mayhem and madness lurks not in the dark shadows of our streets but in the brightest damn daylight. Under your nose. They might even be in line at the check-out stand. If you look hard enough, if you tune into the frequencies of the “up-to-no-good”, it’s obvious that their flocks are growing. Kelly has developed an almost Spidey-sense for the “up-to-no-good”. She’s got a special radar for these kinds that make me think she’ll make Sheriff one day.

Friday, we’re at Cub doing our grocery shopping for the week-end and this Queensryche wannabe comes straight out of Heavy Metal Parking Lot and jumps in line ahead of us at the Checkout. He says nothing to no one but calmly stacks up ten boxes of Aphedrid Tablets!?!?! Now anyone who has watched “C.O.P.S” knows that Aphedrid is one of the principle ingredients found floating around the front seats of stolen pick-up trucks all over Georgia and is used in the chemical construction of the drug popularly consumed as ‘meth’. You just don’t buy 10 boxes of Aphedrid for a bad head cold. But Dr. Dokken, as you can see by the receipt pictured above, does, not only that, but doesn’t even buy anything else. Gum? Cola? Pretzels? “No thanks. just the Aphedrid for me tonight.”

Of course, I’m standing there oblivious to the whole thing. All I can think about is the one pound box of Whoppers in the cart that I am desperate to rip into. But Kelly’s onto him – has been onto him since he walked into the store. She said she didn’t tell me until he left, cause she knows i would have fucked with him. Sometimes the misses knows me too well. Damn. She watches the whole thing go down and snatched the receipt in the hopes that somehow his credit card number is on it and then his name. Sheriff McGruff’s going to turn The Cult guy in. Send him up river. But alas he got away. No good info on the receipt. We also wonder just why the hell this guy and his ten purchases didn’t raise an eyebrow or some red-flag with the Cub Foods cashier? Aren’t they told about these things in training? Doesn’t she watch C.O.P.S? Must we now live everyday wondering in what house lurks the mad meth scientist and his evil ways? We must! For now, we are paying special attention to anyone in the neighborhood listening to that “heavy metal” music.
Not in my backyard Bon Jovi!!

I caught a little bit of Mister Rogers today, while waiting for some pieces to fall into place. I couldn’t tell if it was reruns of old episodes or if what I was watching was made in this century. But damn was it creepy. It was all puppets. It was a skit that featured King Friday and Prince Thursday talking to a bird on a stick that looked like an eighth grade taxidermy project gone askew. There was a women who was also looking for some bird and lamenting the fact that some kid didn’t have a father to teach him music and that she would find this kid a father so the kid could play with all the other kids. just odd. and the whole thing was scored by this out of tune piano that played sparse Sun-Ra type shit: plink-plink-ding-plang-plickity-dang-king-dy. Did I watch this same show when I was a kid?

It made me remember how much i dislike puppets. I really hate them. Clowns too. Why does the world need clowns. I also don’t like people who wear white sun glasses. I don’t like pants. I really don’t like finger pointing, John Grisham novels, parachutes, “The Watchtower” magazine, Dutch Boy paint, etched glass, bad service and the shoes they sell at footlocker.

Sorry for the lapse joel. I mon go tru brudda!

Back. Rested. Sober. Still plenty white. Funny. the thing about Florida is it wants to seduce you. It wants to keep you around. The whole state has this tremendous self esteem problem. Florida thinks that by inviting all its friends over to play in its sandbox and with its toys, that it can forget about all the character flaws that make it a house of dementia and dysfunction. Not that that’s bad. In fact I find it most endearing, the same way I do a friend who comes over for one drink and ends up draining my liquor cabinet and keeping me up till 3AM with the drama of a difficult day. It’s not boring. I think that’s why I like L.A. so much too. It’s pretty fucked up. But once you realize THAT, the spot becomes easily navigable, humorous and beautiful. It’s familiar territory. I suppose it’s like most things, if you realize your being seduced and there’s nothing more agreed upon, no further deals struck, than it becomes easy to enjoy your time and take it for all it’s worth. And we took Florida.

Kelly and I stayed in a swank gated community. Crescent Oaks. With a most amazing dynamic couple and their son who have also learned to take Florida for all it’s got. But they did it one better. They found out how to do it full-time. Truly a gift. A life of sunshine, pool-chilling, flip-flopping, golf, guests, flowers, gators and the good life enter the possibility of every day. It’s a minimalist and wonderfully simple approach, that receives grand applauds from me.

Crescent Oaks offers you about 6 different house models to choose from, and about four Florida colors to decorate with. You have Florida pink or “salmon”, a dusted and washed out sandy yellow, a light gray, and of course white. It’s very common to have the same color house neighboring on another, sometimes three or four in a row, and with almost identical floor plans, it’s easy to walk straight into the wrong house.

The Geckos are everywhere and their larger cousins populate every little body of fresh water that invites you in when it’s 90 degrees out. They say that during the heavy rains even some of the puddles have gators lurking in them. They’re not the only hazard though. The woods are poisonous as well with two or three little types of snake that give you a slight 20 minutes to live once bitten, which makes great fodder on the Crescent Oaks golf course. Each story begins: “My cousin Stan came down for a spell. He hit this shot of the 13th that hooked right into those trees over there…”. And those trees are something else. Straight out of some Tolkien novel. Uneven canopy. Twisted and gnarly. Droopy webs of moss. It’s the darkest place in Florida. I would resign a lot of golf balls.

Photos coming. Stay tuned.

So I’m headed to the banana republic state of Florida next week. There I will hold court, check out some palatial real-estate in some of the finer gated communities, and brush up on my disorganized wedge game. I haven’t been to Florida in a long time. We used to go down there as a family when I was a wee little lad. Growing up, I had some really bad heat rash skin thing that would always cast a dark cloud on my sunny vacations. My skin would get all red and blotchy and start to itch real bad. While others got to frolic and play outside, I had to to stay in the hotel, drop penicillin and watch Miami Vice reruns.

Lucky for me I grew out of this affliction right about the time I was experimenting with hair design, Izods, and puberty. But I still can’t forget it. I was looking around on line for some old school Addidas stylings to sport while kickin’ it on the Miami pool side. But I was scared straight when I saw this women model the product. I think I’ll just stick to Bermudas and penners.

My goal in Florida is also to find and buy a cane. Something in a wood finish perhaps. Maybe Teak. I think canes are coming back. The fashion world is ready for canes. Who feels me?