first ever dual lj and blogspot post

well, it's been a while, or something.

news:

the beloved red dragon has finally crapped out its last crap, the check engine providing the blaze for the blaze of glory that was... one of the windows freezing halfway open. sigh. my patrons, i mean parents, sold the car to a 17 year old who either has the 400 bucks to fix the window or will be rockin the garbagebag window. meanwhile, i drive my folks' cars as they look for a replacement car to continue to spoil me with.

goodbye KMT 727. i'll remember the good times: crazily driving through austin after a year of no driving in south america, having a world of music at my fingertips in the 6cd changer, and the northcountry bumpersticker that held on with shitty packing tape for so long.... and the bad times: that phase where it refused to start for 15 minutes or so every couple weeks, the door locks freezing shut making me climb through the trunk frantically to the front to turn the car alarm off (since the alarm logically fires whenever the trunk is opened before the doors...), finding ancient forgotten thai take out in the backseat.

other news: i finished reading my first book for grad school, The Underground History of American Education, by John Taylor Gatto. It was maddeninngly repetitive and unorganized, but i still gotta love gatto... he's pissed off, he's right, and he says stuff like (not a direct quote but you get the idea) "taking religious morals out of western culture in favor of secular scientism is like sawing 2 legs off your kitchen table and replacing one with a stack of dishes and the other with a large dog. it may still stand up, but it's not going to get you through dinner." www.johntaylorgatto.com

it's very strange to be deciding for myself what and how much to read, and now what to write about it... but i'm still so glad i'm doing this and not some normal bs teacher licensure racket.

the end

highway 61 runs right by my baby's door

i am back from an excellent trip backpacking with phil on the superior hiking trail and picking up his bro shawn from a 45 day canoe trip in the arctic.

ups:
-i have wanted to hike this part of the trail (btw magney st park and grand marais) for years, mainly because it includes the only part of the trail to cross hwy 61 and go right on the lake shore. this was indeed awesome, on a windy morning the waves were huge and people were surfing! wild raspberries were in abundance.
-the rest of the route was great too, especially devil's track gorge (a real canyon-seems like in a real mountain range or something) http://oregonstate.edu/~martjona/secondary_pages/MiscIce_files/image005.gif (this pic is from winter but you get the idea)
-relaxing on sunny saturday morning at pincushion mtn. amazing amazing views
-beautiful weather, warm but not hot and only a few hours of clouds
-perfect hiking partner...
-wonderful to go back to menogyn and hear about shawn's insane trip, and see him in his element.
-yummy lunch at angry trout in grand marais
downs:
-sad to see so many dried up creeks after such a dry season.
-crappy traffic
-washing smelly dishes and finding a tennisball sized mold chunk growing in the lemonade cup i left on the counter since the uptown artfair. sick


reading this over, i feel like i haven't really done it justice.... i'll just say, i love the northshore, i love phil, and it's hard to come back and deal with real life (lack of studying, impending move, car troubles, meetings...). i did get my crp refund deposited while i was gone... SWEET. phil's b-day dinner may now involve more than that dusty can of garbanzos on my pantry shelf.

i am the champion

recently, i have been getting things done. but, when i say that, i want to make a getting things done for america joke, since that is the americorps slogan. sadly, i have now learned that there is this get-r-done thing that i just saw on a sticker on a gasguzzler and i don't want to be associated with that.

still. things i have gotten done. (aka, things that i did) (aka things that i made into reality, being a being in-a-situation, making my mark on the situation and being marked by the situation (yay for critical theory nonsensicality)).

yoga
making a new salad (quinoa!)
stirring compost with pitchfork
cleaning cursed-never-to-be-eaten ancient items off my shelf in the pantry
dealt with my committee tasks at the co-op
started reading for school
wondering about the Platonic Ideal
had job interview and was hired on the spot. i'll be making $33/hour! (yeah!) and working only 3 hours a week (sniff sniff).

wednesday wednesday

alright. plan for right now.
stop looking at videos on youtube.
figure out if i have all the books i need for first learning packet.
look for needed books online.
read for a while.
yoga.
lunch.
volunteer? (i have to put in 10 hours a week for americorps. i do this tutoring at franklin learning center. i mostly enjoy it... but yet i always put it off til the end of the week.)
co-op.

is this where the hell is matt thing old news? there seem to be a million parodies of it.

pass the dutchie=timeless.

Where the hell is Matt?

look i did it again!

Musical Youth

Hey. i am so smart. i figured out how to blog video.

adios, fidel

really, i don't have any meaningful commentary about fidel...

but i do have a list of additional things i recently have been unable to comment meaningfully on:

-lebabnon
-world cup
-tour de france
-mel gibson
-why i am eating so much red meat lately

in other news... here's a story i can speak to:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/01/world/europe/01france.html

so in paris they truck in a bunch of sand and make a beach along the banks of the seine. i saw it last year, and it looked gimmicky, but fun.

now, they are enforcing rules against toplessness and thongs! a quote from the article:

“young women in search of cool relief are requested to stay decent and not expose their bodily forms to the eyes of passers-by.”

BODILY FORMS. oh the horror.
how disappointing to have france get all prudish in the name of decency.

god didn't draw a line in the sand. or around "decent" and "indecent" bodily forms.

so there.

schoolwork update: yet unstarted.
today or weds. promise.


how can i post a youtube video?? someone help me.