Wordless Wednesday.

Utah all up in my ears: Neon Trees.

So the story isn't much of a story, I suppose, but there was a cute girl roaming around that great Facebook wild and said girl had a boyfriend. Put the two together and you just couldn't look at the girl anymore. See, boyfriend had a mohawk. Eyes went to him. Guys go faux if they're going to anywhere and just aren't wont for going full hawk these days. Then, not too many weeks ago now, there was a concert and I was there and these three were there (mohawk counts as one) and just as happy as they could be. It was a glance that led to a memory that led to this.

It wasn't long before I pegged the same mohawk in the Utah-born band Neon Trees. And, not terribly longer after that, that band was blowing up on Kimmel. I'd like to go ahead and expect good things out of these guys. It's only right.

Delighting in the unabashedly weird.

It's getting harder and harder to find a newspaper. In downtown Orlando, they don't even sell them on street corners anymore, not that I've found. And asking for them usually results in some real confused looks. If you seek, however, you do find. And, had I read this nugget of the Orlando Sentinel yesterday, when I actually got hold of my blessed handful of newsprint goodness (the guy at the coffee shop handed it over for free), I really would have gone to this. At least for part of the time. Ah, missed opportunities.

Sometimes you strike gold. Sometimes it's just too late.

TILIKUNUNDRUM — performance artist Brian Feldman spends 18 hours in a bathtub, 6 a.m.—midnight, March 27; private residence, free.

It was a good day.

Some days, I really do feel like I can take on the world with my writing ... that I can write anything that is needed. Just give me the right kind of pen and paper or right kind of laptop and I'll quietly take on the world in my own corner of it, scribbling down words or tapping at keys.

I'm having one of those days today. And, for the record, it feels really, really good.

I'm unloveable.

So, what you're saying is, it's not entirely normal to wake up before 5 in the morning to share one of the best music videos and songs you've seen and heard in too long a time? Yeah? Well, who asked you?

And, no, I don't know terribly much about Babybird (aka Stephen Jones), but I do know this video was directed by one barely known guy by the name of Johnny Depp. I'm not sure it makes it any better than it'd have been otherwise. I do know I can't help but return to this song, over and over again. I know owning this album is probably in my future. I also know you'll like this one a whole lot, too, given time. (Okay, so I don't know that, but I can hope for it.) So, see? I know stuff.

That said, I only sleep when I want to. And, having slept in a bed and room and house all not quite my own for the past number of weeks, I choose not to sleep for the time being. The same goes for the dog next door, who seems plenty spooked. Bring on that dawn.



Unloveable

Wordless Wednesday.

Because it made the most sense.

If you’re wondering whether or not you ought to grab a couple friends, buy some flashlights on a whim and head over to the most alligator-infested lake in all the world one warm night to shine some lights in some gator's eyes, don’t just wonder about it. Do it. You might only see one alligator and he might not even be full grown and there might only be a fleeting armadillo or two (they being more scared than you and your cohorts), but … but. There will also be the hundreds of the barely-hidden frogs that sing in chirps and talk towards no one in particular. There will be cranes in the marshy stalks that make sounds so delightfully absurd in the moonlight, they sound like they’ve decided to mimick the frogs. There will even be a nearby orange orchard that’ll take you to an entirely new place with the smell surrounding its trees.

And, oh yes, the oranges you borrow from those branches that night, the impossible too-sweet-to-real ones, the ones you can’t help but drip all over yourselves on the long stroll back to your car? They may be the real reason you ended up there, after all. You just didn’t know it, not yet.

That's what he said.

"If you want to keep your memories, you first have to live them."

– Bob Dylan

Blood on the Dance Floor.

Tonight ended in dancing, mostly with people I’ve only known for a few weeks and some I’d only known for a few hours.

It started as an idea only few followed and, an hour or more later, it ended with plenty of people following suit, sweating smiling, complaining about sore knees, throwing around Mardi Gras beads and wearing feathered masks. They danced. They danced hard. I even just discovered a cut on my chest … there is blood all soaked up in my shirt, no lie. It’s a bit of a mystery how it happened, but I’m going to go ahead and blame it on a botched attempt at a backspin.

Enthusiasm is infectious, it really is.

That said, I recently discovered a Nigerian singer, who, while I adore her for a myriad of reasons, said something in an article that has stayed with me since I read it yesterday. Asked about her budding fame overseas and how she deals with it, she replied: “I don’t think about the next day. I’m just trying to stay in tune with my spirit.”

That’s just a beautiful thought, I think. I don’t want to water down the poetry in her words, but I think it means we ought to look toward our own futures in such a way that we stay true to ourselves. There can’t be a lot of regrets in the end when we choose to follow what is in our hearts: do what you have the most unbridled passion for.

That said, if I was to stay in tune with my spirit, at this moment, I’d want to keep taking more steps forward in this still-new adventure as it continues to pan out, disregarding any fears and uncovering solutions. I’d be hopeful. I’d be optimistic. And I’d do it all for the challenge and the experience and the growth. Big themes and ideas, sure, but relevant all the same.

I think I'm in tune with my spirit. I sure hope I continue to be.

Billie Holiday — Warpaint

I'm in Dallas this weekend. And, well, there's not much I can say about being here thus far other than the bed's comfortable, but I did want to send out a new discovery of a song and band I recently stumbled across. Literally. Have you heard of Warpaint? I hadn't ... but, in that realm of what, exactly? folk? singer-songwriter? girl band? I don't really know where to place them, but I think I like them even more because of that. This one hit me right smack in gills, right from the beginning. See if you can spot that cover in the middle of the song, eh? I kinda even want to send a prize to the person who can name it without leaning on the old Internet crutch to discover it ... my ma had it on a 45 record once upon a time.

Fan-freaking-tastic.



Click me.

More brags on a Tuesday.

Let's make this one big day of brag, shall we? It's nice to be chummy with some real talented folks ... my friend Becky Jean (of The Mollies) recently did a video with her other band, Late Night Alumni. It got some love over on AOL not very long ago. In a word? Cool. Add to that the fact that my friend Damien (nice name) was behind the shooting of said video (which I only barely found out about) and that ups the coolness factor even more. Both of them are just amazing people and amazing talents and I am grateful to know the both of them. Go on, bask in their talent some. Go on. Do it.

Sometimes I steal from my sister.

It's true. I don't mind admitting it. But it's only in the way of taking photos of my nieces and nephews that have been hoarded away otherwise. See, she's got one of those blogs that is reserved for a few select people, so not everyone gets to see the new shots of my nephew. At least, well, that was the case until now. Here's the best of the bunch. Should she ever read this thing, I doubt she'd get after me for doing so. Not too much, anyway.

Us childless uncles have to brag about something, right?

Monday confession.

Sometimes, when I'm feeling overly positive, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and think: "Well, hey, at least I'm not starving."

I Woke Up Today: Port O'Brien.

If you were at The Social with me and a whole slew of others last night, you may have caught Port O'Brien doing the very song that hooked me on them in the first place. Lead singer was even rocking the bare feet throughout his set. The whole time, I couldn't help but think I'd be moving into a loft just a few blocks away from the wee club, where all the bands I enjoy seem to gather on a regular basis. Sometimes life just gets it right, you know? The Fruit Bats are there tonight. I fully plan on hugging them ... but with my ears.

I got shot.

At least it was by someone I trust. Seriously, though, if you ever want some real quality photography done, I'd have to recommend aesonica to help you get done what needs doing. I've used these guys plenty ... and I trust their cameras. They're continually pushing the envelope and adding new tricks to their already big bag of 'em. This little shoot was done in the rain and on the right side of the tracks in Salt Lake City just days before I left there. I'm not really smiling in these photos but, trust me, it was all kinds of fun.

Louder Than Bombs.

It's the sound of what must be hundreds of frogs that makes me visit a back patio in the twilight, so glad at accidental shirtlessness (there are no accidents) and sleepy-surprised at covert rain. There are warm drops on my skin as I hear pond music so much louder than my dreams tonight, music that disregards walls and windows, combines with the mournful cry of a faraway train (no match).

Not too many hours before, I was offered a twenty-spot to swim to the fountain in the middle of this water holding up the moon and lamp light, the water so aptly camouflaging these varied musicians. I ought to do it now that that hot moment has passed, in search of a memory he can't share, this hypnotic soundtrack so filling my ears and assuaging all fears.

And I do.

Snapping to it.

This is that long beginning I want to stretch out like twin handfuls of carnival taffy, no pants anywhere and bare feet pointed to heaven and sun rays slipping in like familiar strangers trying so much in vain to go unnoticed. There are Fruit Bats in my ears telling me that, when I love someone, it’s so hard to think about anything else but to breathe and I want so much to agree. There are thoughts I can clearly hear and possibilities in piles all around this morning bed, all of them acting lazy inside my head. Today, I’ll chew on some big ideas and write more words than this and, hopefully, should there be a God who values the imagination, I might see and speak with an alligator.

My heart still beats for Zooey. Sorta.

I think I'm over pining for Zooey. I've seen her in enough movies and heard her in enough songs and the crush has pretty much come to an end. My "love" has moved a notch down to "strongly like." However, I must say, becoming a missus versus a miss certainly seems to have brightened her disposition, wouldn't you say? I would. Good on you, Mr. Gibbard. Dance, dance, dance.



Watch.

Saturday songing.

Wordless Wednesday: Family Edition.

This is the part where I lean in.

I awoke to the sound of rainfall outside, rain that fell so fast and hard, it only earned its name "shower" in that early gray moment. And the ducks in the pond out back so readily bathed in it and the bird outside my window was only too eager to sing in it. Me, all I could do was look and be amazed and listen and hear that music accompanying the current. And it washed parts of me without ever touching my skin. And it out and out exposed a romantic on accident, a side so usually properly tucked away.