One of Santa's 21st Century Dilemmas

Sun in my mouth today

Bjork's hypnotizing "sun in my mouth" interpretation of e.e. cummings' "I will wade out". Both the song and poem are simply beautiful.

I will wade out
 till my thighs are steeped in burning flowers
I will take the sun into my mouth
and leap into the ripe air
   Alive
      with closed eyes
to dash against the darkness
    in the sleeping curves of my body
Shall enter fingers of smooth mastery
with chasteness of sea-girls
    Will I complete the mystery
    of my flesh
I will rise
    After a thousand years
lipping
flowers
  And set my teeth in the silver of the moon

-e.e. cummings

Happiness is Contagious

"It is a wonderful law of nature, that the three things we crave most - happiness, freedom, and peace of mind - are always attained by giving them to someone else." -Anonymous

It's no surprise that your cheerful state of mind, or that of others, has the power to elevate and spread happiness.

Karen Kaplan's front page article in the Los Angeles Times explores this idea through an enlightening Framingham Heart study published today in the British Medical Journal. The research examined relationships of nearly 5,000 people tracked for decades, basically affirming that good cheer spreads through social networks of nearby family, friends and neighbors.

The feel-good contagion effect shows that just knowing someone who is happy makes you 15.3% more likely to be happy yourself, and even a happy friend of a friend increases your odds of happiness by 9.8%. Happy people in close geographic proximity and larger network sizes also share positive vibes more effectively.


















I believe in the power of social ties and smiles, because "you can't just treat individuals; you have to treat networks and communities." I am eternally grateful for the amazing and supportive people in my life who have helped me stay me, even through this especially turbulent year.

Play Auditorium

I've been addicted to the demo of Auditorium. It's a beautiful puzzle game that flawlessly combines visual and auditory experiences with incredibly simple and intuitive concepts. But it can also get pretty challenging. I haven't really seen anything like this before and I am intrigued! This would be really cool to play on an HD touch screen too.

If you got some time to unwind and energy to compose, definitely check it out.

The Invitation

By Oriah Mountain Dreamer

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living
I want to know what you ache for
and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool
for love
for your dreams
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon...
I want to know if you have touched the center of your sorrow
if you have been opened by life's betrayals
or have become shriveled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wilderness
and let the ecstasy fill you up to the tips of your
fingers and toes
without cautioning us to
be careful
be realistic
to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.

If you can bear the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand on the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
"Yes."

It doesn't interest me
to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after a night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn't interest me who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the center of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like the company you keep
in the empty moments.

Yes We Did, America! Hope Always Wins.

"For as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my story even possible."
- Barack Obama

(Phil Velasquez / Chicago Tribune)

What a poignant, exciting, electrifying moment and movement in world history! Wow, words can not express the way I feel today.

I am so proud not only of President-elect Barack Obama, but also of everyone who came together to make democracy and progress happen before our very eyes. In Alice Walker's thoughtful open letter to Barack Obama, she says "we are the ones we have been waiting for". Her wisdom is true.

I know I'm not alone. The whole world is celebrating intense feelings of joy and renewed promise in the United States of America. Regardless of how you voted, it's a great day to be alive, participate and bear witness to history in the making and breaking. We are moving forward!

"From far away, this is how it looks: There is a country out there where tens of millions of white Christians, voting freely, select as their leader a black man of modest origin, the son of a Muslim. There is a place on Earth — call it America — where such a thing happens."

Poplicks via Patrick Moberg (click to enlarge)

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I guess it's one step at a time though. On a truly disappointing note, I will never understand 52% of California, where some people care more about chickens' rights than fundamental human rights. Are you as confused as I am? The fight against Prop. 8 is definitely NOT over! With lawsuits flying, ballots still being counted and thousands upon thousands of Californians more ready than ever to repeal Prop. 8 (sign the online petition if you can), there's hope that the California State Supreme Court Justices will overturn this illegal step backwards.

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After 8 long years, it's a new dawn, a new day. Sing it high priestess of soul Nina!

progress PROGRESS

Saul Williams, one of my all-time favorite spoken word poets, dynamically delivers "An Open Letter to History":


Click here for more videos from Vote For Change
full text.

Mind Meditation

I was moved today by Priscilla Ahn's hauntingly beautiful voice. Pure sweetness to soothe the soul:


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Experimental duo The Books shares a clever "meditation" word play during a concert in Rome:


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Thailand's Wat Pa Maha Chedio Kaew temple, or Temple of Million Bottles, has "found a way to bottle-up Nirvana, literally", using approximately 1.5 million recycled glass bottles for sustainable building material.

via Inhabitat

Venice Beach Mural Sightings

Chase's colorful creatures and floating eyes inspire self-awareness:

R. Cronk's stunning 1990 homage to Van Gogh's Starry Night:

Recycled Goods

Newspaper furniture - your very own "reading butt-y":

Photo: David Stovell Design

Grist via Inhabitat:

"Instances of talking out of your ass are well-documented, but reading out of your ass -- now that's new."

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In Jean Shin's interactive sculpture "TEXTile", 22,528 recycled keyboard keys are embedded into a continuous fabric, complete with video projection. Yvonne Oswald on KPFK's The Aware Show recently said that our communication is 7% verbal, 38% tonal and 55% body language. Can you imagine all that gets lost in translation and interpretation in our world of email and texting? A fascinating and labor-intensive piece that investigates our virtual communication culture:

"The project speaks to the pervasiveness of email in our lives while commenting on the fact that, despite the modern technology of virtual communication, our written language is linked to the tactile sensation of moving our fingers over an outmoded typewriter system."

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Fridgehenge, a short-lived 21st century take on Stonehenge, just outside Sante Fe, New Mexico:

Earth Ambience and Brian Eno

Here are a few ethereal and simply stunning seasonal time lapse videos inspired by one of the most original and too often overlooked electronic gurus of our time: Brian Eno. These videos have got to be some of the best on YouTube; beautifully capturing earth's work with an impeccable soundtrack that can't be beat...

Brian Eno - This


Brian Eno - How Many Worlds


"All deep things are Song...The primal element of us; of us, and of all things...See deep enough, and you see musically; the heart of Nature being everywhere music." - Thomas Carlyle

Everything is Illuminated

via Lost At E Minor, I came across Orange County artist Kristian Olson today. I love the outer-worldly subjects and mysterious organic themes, the often muted color palette, the detailed ornamentation influenced by cultural motifs and the skillfully crafted combination of mixed-media (designed digital artwork, giclée printing, acrylic paint) with illustration.

"Kristian Olson’s illustrations look like Magic Eye posters that have come to life as marauding, fractal-shooting creatures from Technicolor hell."

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The photo below captures a new interactive Dobpler LED wall in Sandnes Sentrum, Norway that transforms shadows into light as people walk through a pedestrian subway tunnel. Perhaps this is the kind of multifunctional ingenuity we need here to encourage more public transit riders.

via Inhabitat:

"The Strømer is an interactive wall that weaves a wonderful mixture of art, energy-efficiency and play into the fabric of daily existence."

Watercolours, the project website for the installation in Sandnes states:

Sandnes’ city centre is split in two parts by the railway line. A new, creative illumination of our railway station subways will give us safer traffic and walkways. The subways become lighted portals, pleasant to use, mirroring the users who can observe themselves and others as active elements of the township.

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A less useful but rather amusing LED tech gadget is USB powered Tengu, who's facial expressions and mouth lip-syncs with the sounds in the room - whether it be you or your music. This little buddy keeps you company when you're on the comp and he even sings Seu Jorge in the video below! Awesome.

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WTF?! Disgusting full-blown desperation...

A West Plains, Missouri billboard via SLOG

"I've been thinking about this McCain-Palin Obama "palling around with terrorist" idea more lately. The saddest thing about many Republicans isn't just that they disagree with liberals on race--it's they are largely ignorant on race. When the McCain campaign cast the spell of diabolical jingoism, they have no idea of the forces they are toying with. We remember Martin Luther King's murder as a sad and tragic event. Less remembered is the fact that ground-work for King's murder was seeded, not simply by rank white supremacy, but by people who slandered King as a communist."
-Ta-Nehisi Coates

This gotcha clip reveals how McCain's "straight talk" is going hate talk express. The Nation's Ari Melber on pathetically injecting baseless hate:

Solar Subsidy Shines

On the upside, there's a happy solar lining to the deeply loathed and pricey bailout. The excellent news: domestic solar energy and green jobs will finally get a chance to go mainstream with the bill now extending federal investment tax credits for renewable energy providers, especially in solar energy development. Better late than never! Even though solar power currently represents not even 1% of the $3 trillion global energy market, industry professionals are saying that California is positioned to be both the world's next big solar market and its entrepreneurial center.

via Grist Muckraker:

"Congress last week passed long-awaited extensions to tax credits for solar, wind, geothermal, and other forms of clean energy; they were attached to the financial bailout package that President Bush signed last Friday. Renewable-energy companies let out a big sigh of relief, happy that months of delays and petty squabbles over the tax credits were over. The legislation also provides incentives for the development of oil shale, tar sands, and coal-to-liquid fuels, which environmentalists are less happy about. But overall, renewables advocates and enviros are delighted that Congress finally got the tax-credit extensions through, just before adjourning for election season. As for how happy they feel about the bailout package in general, well, that's another story."

Stand up for Equality! NO on Prop. 8

When I read the Mojo Blog this morning, I was shocked to find out that the Gay marriage ban was actually succeeding in California. In the first three months since same-sex marriage rights were legalized this June 17, more gay couples (approximately 11,000 couples) were married in California than were married in the first four years it was legal in Massachusetts. "Next month, Californians will decide whether gay couples can continue to marry when they vote on Proposition 8, which would amend the state Constitution to define marriage as between only a man and a woman."

Why would you try to take an already existing fundamental right away and write discrimination into the California constitution?! I couldn't agree more with what the Los Angeles Times Ed. Board proclaimed in their endorsement for No on Prop. 8 back in August:

"Civil rights are commonly hard-won, and not the result of widespread consensus... Fundamental rights are exactly that. They should neither wait for popular acceptance, nor be revoked because it is lacking."

To all California residents --

Wake up and stand up for LOVE, EQUALITY, and PROGRESS. Please vote NO on Prop. 8. An inspiring video a friend recently shared:

Banksy's Village Pet Store and Grill

"This revolution is for display purposes only"
-Banksy

Graffiti genius Banksy just opened his "Village Pet Store and Grill" a few days ago in NYC, at 89 West 7th Avenue. You may not recognize his work though because there's no writing on the wall here...

Using animatronics for his first time, Banksy has created an eye-opening and chilling world where "there are no puppies or kittens in the windows". Instead, "McDonald's Chicken McNuggets sip barbecue sauce. A rabbit puts on her makeup. A CCTV camera nurtures its young." Banksy's groundbreaking social commentary confronting the way we live and intelligently raising questions about where animals go, runs through Halloween and might be recreated elsewhere later. Hopefully, the West Coast!

via Wooster Collective:

Lifeless leopard coat

Hot dogs trapped

Nuggets in a coop

Bunny testing make-up

Fishsticks in a fish bowl

Live sneak peak:

From Banksy:

“New Yorkers don’t care about art, they care about pets. So I’m exhibiting them instead. I wanted to make art that questioned our relationship with animals and the ethics and sustainability of factory farming, but it ended up as chicken nuggets singing. I took all the money I made exploiting an animal in my last show and used it to fund a new show about the exploitation of animals. If its art and you can see it from the street, I guess it could still be considered street art."

Do-it-yourself Pixelator in NYC

Turning plasma ads to pixel art.

"Since 2003, the MTA has made available for exhibition purposes 80 LED screens located at subway entrances across New York City. Unfortunately, the high cost of exhibiting (an estimated $274,000 per month per screen) prevents most artists from having access to these facilities. While the MTA's effort to create more opportunities for video art exhibition in public spaces is to be commended, selected works remain wholly fixated on commercial goods and media conglomerate events, a short-sighted curatorial choice that regrettably ignores the full potential of these promising exhibition spaces.

In an attempt to broaden the scope of MTA's video art series, Pixelator takes video pieces currently on display and diffuses them into a pleasant array of 45 blinking, color-changing squares. Since the project is an anonymous collaboration, the resulting video is almost entirely unplanned and unanticipated, with the original artists helping to create new works of art without any knowledge of their participation."

DIY!
via A Life Less Mediated

Los Angeles may be going Blade Runner too, with "roughly 900 billboards across the city that could soon be converted from conventional to digital, lighting up your street or bedroom with a 50,000-watt flash," says Steve Lopez of the Los Angeles Times. He urges Mayor Villaraigosa to adopt restrictions on what will be distracting saftey hazards and a "congested constellation of 900 drive-in movie theaters."

Summing up the now global financial crisis.

via The Consumerist
via Blame it on the Voices

Eve Ensler on Security and Freedom

TED could not have timed the September release of this moving Eve Ensler presentation any better (a visionary role model for women of the world!). While she gave this talk back in 2005, her wisdom is necessary and relevant to our election season. Eve is having "Sarah Palin nightmares" like the rest of us, as she recently shared in a bold op. ed in the Huffington Post. She's one of my favorite storytellers.

Art to Appreciate!

A "New and Native" Beauty: The Art and Craft of Greene & Greene; The Huntington Library; San Marino, CA (show runs 10.18.08 - 1.26.09)

The Gamble House announces:

"This landmark exhibition celebrating the work of Greene & Greene is a partnership between The Gamble House and The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, and will feature 140 works designed by the Greenes covering the breadth and depth of their careers. The pieces to be displayed come from private and institutional lenders and, in some instances, have never been seen by the public. They include stained glass, metalwork, textiles, drawings, archival photographs, and virtuoso wood-carving and decorative inlay designed by the Greenes and executed by the master craftsmen with whom they were associated."

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Sea Stone Vases by Mitsuru Koga; Tortoise; Venice, CA (show runs 10.9.08 - 11.2.08)

Mitsuru Koga on his organic masterpieces via Hustler of Culture:

"My creations come from the ocean. Stones alter their size and shape being washed down the river, slowly but naturally. My works are born as a part of the nature's current - not a thing is unchangeable there. That's the way I envision the crossroads of nature and human beings in my works."

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Joshua Petker; Corey Helford Gallery; Culver City, CA (show runs 10.04.08 - 10.22.08)

Manuel Bello of Fecal Face writes:

"Joshua Petker is a southern California artist who pulls no punches when it comes to cutting the shit right down to the bone. He spends his time suffering over canvas, diving out in his Hollywood living room, die-harding for the Dodgers, and all around keeping his feet planted flat on the ground. He has a style that you might not want to take home to mom, but would defiantly want to take home from a seedy LA bar. Seductive, scandalous, and downright hot in the worst way. His paintings are like that girl that you know will destroy you but somehow you just can't resist."

We The People Festival (9.27.08 -9.28.08)

We The People Festival -- I couldn't have imagined a better way to enjoy my birthday in this historical, "tipping point" moment in our lives. It was an empowering day through night event celebrating social consciousness, community activism, and urban youth and culture via raw uncensored music and art - the way I love it.

The live performances we caught included Dilated Peoples, RZA of Wu-Tang Clan, DJ Z-Trip (dedicated his turntablin' set to Barack Obama and mobilizing voters), Flying Lotus (my favorite show), Bassnectar and Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine (the way I remember him, at least). It's a shame we missed roots reggae classic Barrington Levy and bassist extraordinaire Les Claypool though, since there were too many solid stages to choose from.

Here's a taste of what we appreciated -- click to enlarge images (not pictured but definitely devoured: raucous, rhythmic, truly fertile electric music embracing a backdrop of the downtown LA skyline and passing metrolinks, endless Blue Moons, endless sunshine, amazing baked yam with cinnamon/brown sugar/butter, baked potato with the works, and grilled seasoned corn. bliss.).