Moving on

Did I forget to tell you? This blog has upped and moved to its new, Wordpress-hosted location over at lucaswetzel.com. I started posting there while in Berlin last year and plan to keep it going now that I'm back in Kansas City. I'm keeping the "lucubrations" name because it's an accurate portrayal of what I do and I like it better than having my name in big letters as the header. Will miss this little blog-spot, which started out in late 2005 as "The Recently Updated Sufferings of Young Wetzel," but hey — it was a good run. Thanks for reading and see you on the new site.

Life on the edge

This is a piece I made out of an old map. I bought it for Jenny at the antique market because she likes maps, but then I realized it was one of those America-centered maps, which she hates. These days the politically and geographically appropriate cut-off point is the Bering Straight, with the Americas on the left/West and Eurasia on the right/East. You almost never see Eurasia in the center, so I thought that would be fun to create. I accomplished this by taking an exacto straight down the 95th meridian, slicing just between the words "Kansas" and "City" (hence the labels).

A few things I like about this map:

• It makes Kansas City the effective end of the Earth (which some people refer to it as anyway)

• "Kansas" falls off into the Western U.S. while "City" is lumped in with the East Coast capitals. Politically, it works as well, with "Kansas" on the right and "City" on the left.

• The Soviet Union appears on the reconstructed map as the "Sovioviet Union."

If anyone would like a copy in postcard form, I'd be happy to send. If anyone wants the actual map, you've got 5 days to claim it before it goes out in the recycling bin. Which, in the end, is probably for the best. This Earth could stand to be recycled.

Ree Yees In case you didn't see these two open for the Lightning Bolt last month at the Jackpot

That is my brother James and his brother Eric

If you were born in the nineteen eighties like me, you have every excuse for not originally giving Cher the credit she is due. But after hearing her version of my favorite Dylan mix-tape staple (and seeing the pantomime with the late great Sonny B), I felt the need to share this with my friends. I first heard it at a bookstore in Oxford, MS and plucked it from the Zamboni Soundtracks comp that includes timely songs like this.

It's with me wherever I go

Hello friends and let me be the first to wish you a happy August. I hired the band Love to play this introduction to my first post in a long while. Right now it's all that I know.

What became of the likely lad

Most of you know I'm quick with a light. Not just with lighting cigarettes, but sparklers, fountains, snakes, bottle rockets, etc. In fact I have the blisters to prove it.

I'm going to be taking this all a step further starting tomorrow when I'll be selling fireworks for two weeks out of a tent in the deep south. After that, the Big Easy.

When I return I'll be all kinds of busy posting stuff here and/or a new personal site, wrapping up a few projects, starting a couple of smaller ones. As for KCFreePress.com, I ended my tenure there this month along with the other founding editors. The publisher plans to continue in some form but Jay and I are no longer involved, and Jenn and Emily are finishing up this month. I'll be happy to answer any questions about this. Just stop by my fireworks tent in Waynesboro, MS (I think) anytime up until July 5 and I'll tell you whatever you want to know.

In the meantime, here's a few highlights from the site of my own (below). There are lots of other good stories by other folks, too, but I only had time for a short list here. Wish me luck in the south and I will see you all later.

KCFP highlight reel:

Pistol Social Club closes

Top concerts of 2009

Luke Rocha's study in crime

Matt McGee's Paddles of Fury (ping pong fight club)

Valentunes

An interview with the 'Rockmocker'

Missile strike destroys KC bridge

Guinness brewmaster tells you how to pour the perfect pint

The making of Rob Bingaman's Nevada

An interview with Jerry West of 'Have Guns, Will Rent' costume shop

A conversation I had the other day, in 1963

(sorry, it isn't translated...)

unfortunate cookie

Last Friday afternoon it was sunny and as I walked by the patio at Bo Lings I could hear a table of ladies reading their fortune cookie fortunes. One of them said, "mine was empty," and though her friends giggled, she looked puzzled and even kind of concerned.

I wonder what's going to happen to her.

Springtime for Ghostopolis

My pals and fambly in Ghosty just put out a swell 5-song EP this week on home-grown More Famouser records. Features Suzie on "Quell The Hunger" and Konnor from the ACBs on "Team Up Again." My personal favorite is "Setting Fires," which reminds me of a big fire on the beach. The ever-mountain coastal/Ghost-al flame, if you will. And even if you won't, you might like this video from Vamos. I did a lil' interview with Pat for kcfp last month, too. His most recent collab with Ghosty is embedded below. Preview and purchase the Ghosty EP here.

TEAM UP AGAIN-GHOSTY from PAT VAMOS on Vimeo.

Out into the worldness we did roam...

Wanted to send this out to Bridget, whose birthday was today. She was the first person who ever made me a tape with Daniel Johnston's music on it. I didn't know he was this wild-eyed at the time, and I've only grown to like it more even if I'm still not ready to pony up for one of his art pieces. What I like about this clip (besides the rhythmic build which reminds me of "Speeding Motorcycle") is the way he's got them spellbound with poetry as much as song. Speaking of poems, Bridget's, "The Wild Boy of Aveyron Stands Up During a Dinner Arranged by the Doctor" is a recent favorite of mine and I'm sure she's been working on a lot more since that was published.

More lit kicks, hellos to friends, songs, comics and such to come soon, but before that, expect some field recordings of bullfrog mating call crossfire recorded at a nearby pond (which, if you think about it, is probably the ultimate inter-species shout-out to friends).

This Better Not Be Your Life

Ever wonder if anybody cares? From time to time, I think we all do. But don't worry. Somebody does care.

Specifically, "Operation Somebody Cares" cares.

I know, because when I was riding the bus the other day I found one of those little religious booklets on the floor. You know the kind — cheap, poorly illustrated, and designed to let you know how deathly important it is that you renounce your sinful ways and start praying to Jesus/Joseph Smith/Xenu, etc.

The booklet, entitled "What Is Your Life Story," was a part-Revelations, part-"Christmas Carol" tour through the life of a lustful, materialistic gentleman who is lead by an angel through the follies of the various stages of his life. There's some pretty heavy shit here, from fiery angels to grim reapers. A more accurate title might even be "Operation Somebody Scares."

I looked through the book and read various passages out loud to Jenn and my fellow bus riders, most of whom were either asleep, not innarested or just feigning sleep/disinterest because they were so scared. I have since discovered that you can read the whole thing here, but while I was still on the bus I did a bit of editing to condense the booklet down to its essence. I hope you get something out of it, because it sure as shit spoke to me.


(click to enlarge)

KCFreePress.com turns 4 months old!

This week was a big week for birthdays in the KC Media circuit. Ink turned 2, which they announced with a cover story featuring a photo of a young lady eating a lollipop and a list of activities readers should engage in to indulge their inner child. Among them: "Go to a petting zoo," "color outside the lines," and "have a tea party."

Though I wasn't super inspired, I know from experience how hard it can be to come up with hard-hitting content. Still, "go to a petting zoo?" Just sounds a bit, I don't know...escapist. Nonetheless, I was inspired enough by Ink's cover story to compile my own birthday pat-on-the-back for our own widdle web site. With apologies to Ms. Watrous and company, here goes:

KCFreePress.com just turned 4 (months old), and we’re partying appropriately.

Which means doing all the stuff we loved to do as babies.

To celebrate this milestone in our infancy, we've come up with 4 ways to transport yourself back to early, early childhood.

1. Cry - Because it feels good to let it all out

2. Poop in your pants - Very messy, but at this stage, still socially acceptable

3. Get burped - Because you're not old enough to do it yourself yet, silly!

4. Tune out all real-world problems, news, or social issues - Not to worry, babe. Your parents will take care of you!

Student River

The other day while driving with Jay back from the taco place we drove past a semi trailer driven by a student driver but on the lettering the D had fallen off so it just said

STUDENT
RIVER

Doesn't really make sense, but I found it sort of profound, or at least, poetic.

Ice-skating into the Marchland

As the full moon passes into a new month I'm just resting up from a a cathartic Elton John sing-a-long on Adams street and quietly slugging my way through several epic works of lit and film that I was warned not to mess with in winter.

That, and I've been working on the still-in-its-infancy but nonetheless quite substantive Web site, kcfreepress.com. It's very much a work in progress, as I imagine all Web ventures and publications are to a large extent, but it's been fun and educational thanks to the fine crew of people I've been able to meet and work with so far. Lots of great writing and photography and I'm looking forward to being able to help present even more of it in the upcoming months.

Many of you have taken part in some fashion, and some of you are just waiting on me to get isht together so your contributions can be presented in a way we can be proud of. Thanks for your patience with me and get in touch if you have any ideas, recommendations or reminders.

Also please excuse the lack of fresh links, videos, songs and ruminations on this here blog site. It's not going away, but the especially harsh winter led to an extended hibernation.

I'll be posting some more stuff + music here soon and in the meantime you can see some of my recent stories here. I recommend at least reading the one about ping pong or listening to the one about love songs. In other publishing notes, I think some of my haiku are going to be printed soon in a journal in Croatia, which is great for Dalmations but only reminds me I need to look further into what literary events are going on in this area.

Most importantly I want to send greetings and congratulations to friends here and overseas. Friends becoming parents and godparents, moving to Spain, starting new work and projects here in KC, quitting jobs and moving on, recording music, starring in high school productions of "Footloose," going out on first dates, celebrating anniversaries, establishing beachheads in Panama, slinging holiday chocolates, getting published, selling tea at the mall, opening hookah bars, playing and recording music, finishing thesis statements, living life.

Also, congrats to Canada and Chris, I take back all the shit-talking from a few days ago. I knew it would catch up to me in the end. It always does.

Looking forward to seeing what the year of the tiger (and the conclusion of "Lost") has in store for us all. Keep me posted, and to paraphrase Mr. Nolte: "Una mas cheerzies"

LDHW

Christmas lights

The lights have been mostly off around this blog site lately, but I can assure you it's for good reason.

For the last several months I've been working with a few dozen editors, writers and photographers to help create a new online news and entertainment site for Kansas City called KCFreePress.com, which John at Bottomline Communications was kind enough to do a write-up for earlier this evening.

The site won't go live until a week from today, and even then we'll have plenty of design tweaking to do. Building a Web site isn't easy, I've learned, but I'm confident that the strength and uniqueness of our content and presentation will carry us through the rest of 2009 into a lasting spot on the local Internets.

Although it probably seems like we're coming out of nowhere, that's not exactly the case. The contributors to KCFreePress.com are made up of some of the area's most interested and talented bloggers and photographers -- people who have worked at professional media outlets or are already writing at a professional level. I won't drop any names here, but suffice it to say that several of the contributors will be familiar names to readers of local media, and those that aren't will (we hope) become familiar voices before too long.

I've got plenty more to say about the site -- who we are, what you'll find there and why we felt like Kansas City was in need of a new media outlet -- but I'll save that for my intro column. In the meantime, you can go to kcfreepress.com to get your name added to the info list, find us on facebook, or just check back on the site next week.

Thanks for your interest and support, and see you soon.

Lucas

Autumn Caught Em

'Tis now the time of year in which I post pictures of me high up in some tree or perched out on the Pinnacles. Usually I would accompany such a photo with a bit of translated or untranslated poetry, but this time I'll just suggest Trakl and leave it at that.

Posted some seasonal tunes up on thelukebox for all of you at home and on the road. Also let me remind you to check out Ghosty's A Mystic's Robe EP.

When I'm not out climbing I'm busy working and writing, looking forward to working with and seeing many of you over the Pumpkin holidays. I've been taking videos here and there but will probably postpone posting any more shorts until I've brushed up a bit on my skills. In the meantime my alt-persona duke will be holding it down with scotch tape and twitter-text. Don't take this as flight from the blogosphere (I never completely check out of here) just a chance to chase colorful nonsensical twine from branch to branch before all the leaves fall completely.

And anyone looking for a Hugh Cameron birthday tribute can check the archives or wait until the celebration of the centennial of his death this December. More from lucubrations sometime soon. In the meantime, here's a bonus pic of the Big Tree.



And just for fun, another shot from Natalya Bond taken last week at the doorway of the Devil's Icebox.


I like it because of the lighting, and also because it almost looks like Jonna and Deebs are looking up in anticipation of an avalanche of leaves. More pictures from that set here.

James Wetzel is...

What it feels like to get hit by a dodgeball

Some of you may have noticed that I've been walking funny lately. It's not just that I'm trying out new gaits (or strides, saunters, swaggers). It's just that I've just been drilled by dodgeballs too many times at close range and it's starting to effect both my posture and my brain cells. I can barely count to 14 without getting confused and the other day when someone was talking about helping a photo client with thumbnails I thought she was talking about the nails on her actual thumbs. No complaints, though. I feel more alive than I have in weeks, and if I have to pay for it with my health, than so be it. Speaking of health-impairments, anyone who wants to risk damaging their hearing in the most delightful way possible should come down to the West Bottoms art fair thing at 6 to hear Ree-Yees and friends. Here's a flier with details that you might even be able to read.

Thursday Tracks: "Kelly Ann" Remix

Nice write-up and update about Suzannah Johannes from Jason Harper today on the Pitch blog. Also features a lovely, ethereal remix brother Deez did of one of my first favorite tracks of hers (and lyricist Hans Bronze). The EP is still for sale at Love Garden and a steal for only 5 bucks and there are some great tracks on Daytrotter as well. I also recommend the Turnpike episode about her for a good intro to Suzie's music, complete with nursing home performance and fireside singing.

(and yes, I know it's not technically Thursday anymore, but no one told me Short Cuts was actually over 3 hours)

Big Giant & Little Giantess

The complete photo set is here, and a video (in German) here.

Did any of you go to this? What was it like?

Ferris Wheel

Ferris Wheel from Lucas Wetzel on Vimeo.

I got a flip cam the other day and have been putting it to use as much as possible. I'll post a selection of short clips soon, but for now here's my most ambitious project to date: a five minute, four-second montage of rides and crowd scenes at the Lee's Summit Oktoberfest. The song is something I heard in a Munich kellarbar of all places. It's by a Texas musician named Paul James.

Ewa Demarczyk

Been buying some foreign dollar records at the Super Flea. Here's the video of a recent find, from Polish singer Ewa Demarczyk.

For a slightly more uptempo performance by the so-called "Black Angel of Polish Song," here's a great performance of Karuzela Z Madonnami from 1966.

Under the radar and dreaming

Shaggy Quatro will be performing a solo set on the earlier side of things. Will still probably be more noise than a group of 10 people. A bunch of little-known local artists will be performing at both venues. Should be fun.

We're coming full circle...

Ain't Forgot Nothin

Heard somebody blog today that people have forgotten about 9/11. Not so, as you'll see from this 9/11 post from a few years back.

To commemorate I am supposed to go for some BBQ pork chops at Kyle's but I got waylaid listening to tunes such as this live take of the opening track from Sonic Youth's "New York City Ghosts & Flowers."

If the full-blown patriot musical act is more your speed, however, don't forget to bump this 9/11 classic from Darryl Worley. Regardless of whatever's up with those "Fat Cats in Washington," KC never forgets.

Some music to drown out these crickets

Juan & Junior. English version here.


I like seeing groovy videos of groovy songs from the era before people knew out to groove out in a socially acceptable manner


bébé éléphant

Hwy 24 revisited

Last night around midnight Jennifer and I treated ourselves to a bite of year-old wedding cake. I hadn't heard of this tradition until my mother procured the frosted artifact last week from the family freezer. It was surprisingly palatable after we let it thaw for a few hours. I'd even go so far as to call it tasty.

We spent our anniversary the way I imagine many couples do -- strolling around for hours at the Kansas City Zoo. Later that day when I fell asleep for a nap I thought about the comforting presence of all the animals and how extraordinarily human some of the primates (especially the Blue Monkey and the ancient Orangutan couple) appear when they look you in the eye.

As some of you might have noticed I have not been blogging very frequently, though not for lack of excitement on the home front. After Mexico I decided to try and extend my streak of eating nothing but Mexican food with the occasional slice of pizza. I finally gave in on August the 14th when I ate a schwarma at the Habashi House. Yesterday I got a Pignose amplifier that sounds every bit as pugnacious as I could have hoped. A bunch of storms happened and I drove out to the middle of Kansas to watch the Perseids without any light pollution. Also I am working rather diligently on a few new projects that will be unveiled before too long.

In the meantime I am still posting songs on the lukebox, which Robert of Sonic Spectrum recently called his new favorite podcast, throwing a wee bit of traffic its way after 3 years of near-obscurity. I'm trying to link back to labels and such now but it's still a mostly no-frills place to stream all the songs you might not have heard. Many of these I heard through my friends (the implied "you" in the 4-year run-on sentence that is lucubrations) and some are even by them. A lot of these tunes were played at the wedding party last summer, so if anyone wants to sing along, feel free.

Speaking of streams, Blue says she's holding on to the stalactite of summer as tightly as she can, but is rapidly slipping. I don't have the heart to tell her she's fighting a losing battle. Who knows, though -- maybe we're in for an Indian summer.


Later, lemurs.

Incredible account of a Sunday afternoon spent at the Joplin book store

Some excellent street-level reporting courtesy of Dudestache and co:

"Rebels With A Rather Dubious Cause"

Reality on the outer reaches of the Bundeshauptstadt

A classic shot from the Spreepark and the very same funny face cars you get a glimpse of in the Achterbahn trailer, now playing in select Berlin theaters. Pictured in this car are Luna, who just relocated to Berlin, and James, who came back earlier this summer.

Speaking of James, Ree-Yees is playing at the anarchist info shop tonight along with a couple of bands from California. 30th and Troost. See you there.

Nohoch Mul

just mulling things over

World Championships in Kansas City next week

Beginning this weekend, disc-golfers and disc-golf enthusiasts will be taking over Kansas City's parks and wide-open spaces. Kansas City is the host of the 2009 Disc Golf World Championships, which will be played out on 11 different area disc golf courses. Quite a few folks have been working hard to make improvements to each course, including new tee pads, new signs (the one above is not new, btw) and landscaping. Naturally, each course is set up at the most challenging pin placements possible. Expectations and excitement for the event are pretty high, and PDGA sponsors believe there is a good chance this will be the disc golf tournament with 1000 players.

For more information, click here. For more photos of Waterworks, one of the Championship courses, click the photo of the dude sleeping on the upper-deck bench...

While we're on the subject of pics, check out this excellent panoramic shot Giessel took near his parents' farm near Larned, Kansas. Though I haven't seen him yet on this trip in from Cambridge, his enthusiasm for returning to native soil is rubbing off on me in a good way.

In the words of V. Lindsay, "Ho for Kansas, land that restores us When houses choke us When big books bore us!"

photo courtesy of Andrew

Blue, this is that WTC firework fountain I was telling you about. Taken back in the day with my HP PhotoSmart 320 from Wal-Mart. As the label on the firework says: "In lighting this firework, you are not reliving the memory of the tragedy, but honoring the many lives that were lost..."

Moritz Piehler's Peruvian Patio Photos

My dear friend, photographer and Viva con Aguanaut Moritz responded to my request for patio/poetry-inspired photos with two lovely shots from Lima and Cusca, Peru. As promised, here is the Borges poem in the original. Gracias, Moritz!

UN PATIO

Con la tarde
se cansaron los dos o tres colores del patio.
Esta noche, la luna, el claro círculo,
no domina su espacio.
Patio, cielo encauzado.
El patio es el declive
por el cual se derrama el cielo en la casa.
Serena,
la eternidad espera en la encrucijada de estrellas.
Grato es vivir en la amistad oscura
de un zaguán, de una parra y de un aljibe.

Unseasonably cool

Yes, I know the last post about the Ink hotness contest pushed the limits of snarkiness, but now I see it was inevitable. As my friend at the Compendium Tremendium Institute asked me earlier, "How much time passes between the publication of an alternative weekly's ridiculous pander and emergence of a disproportionate backlash in the blogosphere?" Apparently anywhere from 2 to 36 hours, judging by my stopwatch.

Teresa said to me tonight that I must be busy because I hadn't been blogging. That is a post all unto itself. Tonight I'd rather share an early poem from an Argentian whose prose I find difficult but nonetheless greatly enjoy. I usually provide my own photos, but if anyone wants to send me one that this piece reminds them of, I'd be happy to post it along with the Spanish version. I'm going to Mexico soon, though, so it might be a while.

Patio

With evening
the two or three colors of the patio grew weary.
The huge candor of the full moon
no longer enchants its usual firmament.
Patio: heaven's watercourse.
The patio is the slope
down which the sky flows into the house.
Serenely
eternity waits at the crossway of the stars.
It is lovely to live in the dark friendliness
of covered entrance way, arbor, and wellhead

by Jorge Luis Borges
trans. Robert Fitzgerald

Ride your hobbyhorse/Get on your hobbyhorse and ride

The other day while reading Balzac, Jenny stopped to ask me what a hobby-horse is. "Is it actually a toy horse that you ride on?" she asked. I said I was pretty sure it was, but I did an image search just to make sure. Boy am I glad I did. It sure brought back memories.

For starters, there was this lovely portrait the court painter did of my cousin and I back in my pre-tweens.


For those of you who haven't enjoyed such a fortunate childhood as mine, I purloined the following paragraph from a helpful website dedicated entirely to hobby-horse history.

Rocking horses first appeared in Europe in the mid-seventeenth century. In the United States, most horse toys were simple wood, painted or unpainted. This rocker seems to be a particularly elaborate model and was, perhaps, imported. In addition to having a showy horsehair mane and tail, it is covered with animal hide, sports a decorated bridle, and its base is elaborately stenciled and painted to imitate the grain of expensive hardwood. Although at this time some goods were mass produced, this toy was handmade. Hobbyhorses were popular because children could imitate the equestrian skills they were expected to have as adults.


Unfortunately members of my family did not always go on to develop the equestrian skills we were expected to have as adults. My uncle Toby, for example.


In all honesty, I think there was something like this on my Grandpa's farm growing up, probably something he built himself.


I found one of these in our carriage house the other day, but unfortunately there is no trace of the magic ring. If anyone can tell me what all eleven of Blaze's famous sayings are, I'd be much obliged.

Turban Times

The other day when I woke up but before I got out of bed I started thinking about blues turbans. In other words, turbans worn by blues musicians. I'd just seen Billy Cox wearing one in some of the footage of Hendrix's set at Woodstock, and I'm a big fan of Hannibal, who famously wore one on the cover of his record, "Hannibalism." And KK's partner BBQ has been known to sport a turban while playing the kick drum, cymbal and guitar.

Fortunately the search engines directed me to a fabulous gallery and analysis of famous blues turbans, courtesy of the funky16corners blog.

If I may, I'd like to borrow a passage from their intro:

When R&B performers started to wear them, it was a risky move. On the right guy (say, Chuck Willis) a turban could give a good-looking cat an intriguing touch of the mysterious. On someone else, say a maniac like Screaming Jay Hawkins, a turban is just another bizarre accessory, there to let you know that this is not a sane man. That dichotomy, a tenuous balance between the suave and the crazy is where turbans would teeter forever more.

To add a soundtrack to your perusal of the turban hall-of-fame, here's a favorite from The Mighty Hannibal himself.

Fancy that

Yesterday on the way home from centennial park I stopped at the phillips sixty six on ninth to get gas and buy a blue powerade and a hundred grand bar. The total came to three dollars even, which is exactly what I had on me. "Fancy that," I said to the clerk as I handed her the money.

Once I was back in the car I remarked to Jenn isn't it funny how sometimes things you say come out a thousand times more tart than you intended, thanks to a wavering of tone or perhaps just the outmoded nature of the phrase itself.

Jenn took a drink of the blue powerade and said I know why this is so good. It tastes just like those freezy popsicles.

How long can you freak the (dunder)funk?

Last night while playing Balderdash with the Brothers Sisters I happened to draw the word dunderfunk. Contestant guesses included "a state of apathy and dissociation," and "the sound made while beat-boxing," while the correct definition was given as "a dessert dish made of baked biscuits and molasses."

Which sounds delicious. Except as anyone who has ever sailed the scurvy-riddled seas knows, dunderfunk is not so much a delicacy as a poor man's dish also known as Scouse, Lob-scouse, Soft-Tack, Soft-Tommy, Skillagalee, Burgoo, Dough-boys, Lob-Dominion, and Dog's Body.

This information comes courtesy of a well-informed wikisource, though I, of course, typed out the following passage from my great-granduncle's autographed printing of Melville's, "White Jacket" before finding the text online. It reads, as follows:

One clear, cold morning, while we were yet running away from the Cape, a raw boned, crack-pated Down Easter, belonging to the Waist, made his appearance at the mast, dolefully exhibiting a blackened tin pan, bearing a few crusty traces of some sort of a sea-pie, which had been cooked in it.

"Well, sir, what now?" said the Lieutenant of the Deck, advancing.

"They stole it, sir; all my nice dunderfunk, sir; they did, sir," whined the Down Easter, ruefully holding up his pan. "Stole your dunderfunk! what's that?"

"Dunderfunk, sir, dunderfunk; a cruel nice dish as ever man put into him."

"Speak out, sir; what's the matter?"

"My dunderfunk, sir--as elegant a dish of dunderfunk as you ever see, sir--they stole it, sir!"

"Go forward, you rascal!" cried the Lieutenant, in a towering rage, "or else stop your whining. Tell me, what's the matter?"

"Why, sir, them 'ere two fellows, Dobs and Hodnose, stole my dunderfunk."

"Once more, sir, I ask what that dundledunk is? Speak!" "As cruel a nice------"

"Be off, sir! sheer!" and muttering something about non compos mentis, the Lieutenant stalked away; while the Down Easter beat a melancholy retreat, holding up his pan like a tambourine, and making dolorous music on it as he went.

HM, 1850

So do you any of you have any good recipes for the stuff? When it comes to a dish like dunderfunk, I've heard it's best to separate the good stuff from the junk.

Toksha ake wacinyanitin ktelo

There are many legends about the white buffalo in Native American culture, one for just about every tribe. This particular specimen is named "Old Joe," and we saw him on a recent Flint Hills field trip at the Hays House in Council Grove, Kansas. You can read a 1994 Houston Chronicle article about the return of the White Buffalo here. You can get to the Hays House by driving west on 1-70 to scenic highway 77 and heading south through the Flint Hills.


Building in downtown Council Grove


Native American riders just before this month's Symphony in the Flint Hills concert.

All photos taken by Jenny

midsummer nights

It's been a big week.

My dear friends Andrew and Liz are getting married in a few hours.

I lost in tennis three times.

Midsummer night is just around the corner.

My building got struck by lightning and five firetrucks came but the only thing that burned was a fried fuse box.

I tried yet again to write a graduation speech, even though it was 10 years ago.

I ate some pretty fresh tamales.

I'll leave off with a quote from a true sage of the class of 1999, who cut through my whole pseudo-intellectualizing of high school with the simple excellent comment over drinks that high school was a great time.

"Think of all that emotional electricity flowing through us at that time," Damon said (more or less). "That was our sixties."

Friends are on their way and I've got to begin trying the tying a tie process for now, but I wish you all the best with your lives/weekends.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. On Thursday night a few of us sang karaoke.

In case you need a pygmy up

If you've read this blog at all in the last year, you know I love me some hedgehogs.

Well tomorrow is a big day. The Mid-West Hedgehog Show will be taking place from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Shawnee Lodge #54.

What is a hedgehog show? Here's the answer given on the website, where it's written in big red, purple and blue print:

A Hedgehog Show is a show where the Africa Pygmy Hedgehog is put on displayed and judged based on its Coloring, Markings, Age and Gender. Just like a Cat or Dog Show there will be a judge and ribbons given to the "Winning" Hedgehogs" in each of our Classes (Solid, White and Pinto)For those needing more information on the Hedgehog Show Classes check out our page labeled "Show Standards"

We will also being having what is called a "Kid's Class" where children and their hedgehogs are judged based on how the child holds the hedgehog and the hedgehog's behavior to being held which each child will be given a ribbon for.

Also we will have our "Games" Class where you can see how your hedgehog rates compared to other hedgehogs in the different hedgehog games like Hedgie Bowling, Let's Go Hunting, It's Race Time, just to name a few.

This show is open to the public and with or without a hedgehog everyone is welcome to come and join us.

And yes, there will be hedgehog bowling.

Warwickshire Menagerie

One of several "hear/speak/see no evil" displays at my house. Though this one looks more like a close-up shot of two onlookers at a circus who have just witnessed something terrible take place in the motorcycle cage (for example).


Hedgehog candle brought to you by Waxman


Our one real (guest) animal. Kiki is staying with us for a few days and maybe a month later in the summer. At first I was not thrilled about the idea of pet-sitting, but Kiki is easy to love.

Top two photos by Jenn, photo of Kiki by sister Jess

WREX VS. HEXE

A new track from Ree-Yees recorded yesterday. James on drums, Eric on vox and effects. Or as they put it, James = time, Eric = space. Photo taken in Galesburg circa November 07. Careful it will put your speakers to the test.

The end of analog

What an old TV looks like on film

Godesberg at sunset

Godesberg sunset

Triple Triptych

planes plains ducks bench duckshadow


new mission to generate ideas


gasworks