I went to a poetry slam this Monday and there was this native American Chief who got up and spoke. He talked about people on the Indian reservation and how bad conditions where there. he talked about the cold and hunger. This made me think of my childhood. I grew up on a farm until age 13. When I say farm maybe you could say it was more like a commune because we lived on this farm with other families. The condition would be considered bad to anyone living in a city. I mean I met some poor kids in my life like friends in high school who grew up in the projects and they had allot more then I ever had as a kid. We had no running water, no electricity no TV and not allot of food. My mom was on welfare and lived of of about $350 a month I believe. We never went Hungary to many times but I have felt the sting of an empty stomach. Our diets consisted of mostly rice and oatmeal cooked on an open fire. Not sure if you have ever had oatmeal cooked on an open fire in a cast-iron pan but take my word for it there was allot of black stuff in the food and it did not taste good. We did not have sugar or anything to make it taste better. I remember as a kid me and my good friend ( Matt ) would walk 5 miles to town and collect cans and trade them in for 50 cents and buy some sugar. I am sure my mom never knew about this but yes sugar can go along way with the same old oat meal day after day. To us a dinner with hot dogs was a luxury. However we did not know we were that poor. We did not know what this meant. Later on in life when I saw kids who were growing up in the projects killing them selves for a pare of shoes or money to buy a car or gold rings I never understood this. I always said to myself who cares if you are poor. Family friends and having something to eat was all you needed. But yet kid after kid would pull a trigger for money. I never understood this and even now after being a self made person who could pretty much retire and stop working, being able to have anything I want I still never buy anything that outrageous or try to show off by buying expensive things. I have a theory on this. if you are poor and do not know what you are missing you do not care. Its only when you are poor and see others around you with more then you that you start to care. When I was a kid, super poor I never was un-happy or felt bad about being poor. So money can not buy you happiness. But it can make you happy in the short turn spending it on something cool I guess. But that is short lived compared to friends and family.
THE POOR THEORY
When you grow up poor you either do one of two things. When you get out of being poor you either spend ever cent you have trying to make up for the fact that you were poor. Trying to hide being poor. Buying nice cares and anything else nice. Never having money in the bank. Always spending it. or you do like me and save and invest it with because some where in the back of your mind you are afraid to be poor again. its like my dad once told me he always has to have a full refrigerator because because as kids they never had anything in the refrig and having it empty makes him feel really bad. my pops always grew up very poor in va beach. His dad who I never knew was in the navy. As a little kid this was me. Always afraid of not having anything again. I thank my mom for this gift however because everything I have. All of the great things I can buy I truly enjoy ever minute of it all. Some people would grow up being so rich and never truly understanding this or truly feeling lucky. I feel lucky ever day of my life for the luck I have had.
WHY I HATE FISH
Ok people always ask me why I hate fish it belongs in the country boy blog post. In California they have a place near the rivers called fish hatcheries. Basically the government take salmon and pulls the eggs out and gives the fish away so they can bread more fish and put them back into the wild. Well my mom had us wait in life to get the free fish. As kids we would each hold a place in line. Get as much fish as you could get. I have vivid memories of cleaning the fish with my hands in the extremely cold weather. Hands so cold I could not feel them. We canned the fish with out any flavoring. Oh my got I can taste it still. So bad not fit for a human. Maybe it was the way we cooked it maybe it was just because there was no seasoning but it was nasty. I used to not like rice for a long time also but man who can stay mad at rice :-)
( photos - me digging a ditch with my older bro in the back ground. we worked from sun up to sun down. Very hard labor. First thing in the morning going to fetch water a good hike away in the oh so bitter cold. yes I am very dirty in the photo we did not have showers so we often were extremely dirty. )
So many childhood stories I will have to write more as i can think of them.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
London Baby Here They Come
I am crazy silly siked today. I just found out that all of our friends from London are coming to the US to visit us. I had the pleasure of meeting most of the people coming on my London/Paris trip last year. We were also able to move the yearly anniversary party to this day so this means Philly Mike and others can visit them all at one time. One of the sweetest things to me about this site is the ability to meet people in fare off countries and have them show you around and then when they visit you, you get the pleasure of showing them around. its like spreading the love around all over the country. Being able to do good deeds for people and showing them your culture and communities. So lets look at how closed we really all do live together.
MEETin Spreading good deeds
Here is one example I love. One friend of ours Huy from MEETinBoise ( well he is a friend now since we met him in London ) was flying to Paris for the convention. He was in a bike accident before he left from Boise. I guess in flight to Paris his leg started to act up. he had to go to the hospital when he landed. Some of the MEETinParis people , people he never met in his life came to the hospital only after Huys girl friend post on the message he was stuck in the hospital. The hanged out with him in the hospital. How cool is that you go to a city and country to never met anyone and people come and visit you. When we arrived from DC my friend Charann had her credit card stopped. Our new friend ( Xavier ) from Paris not only brought us to his home to call for free America he also brought us to an awesome French restaurant in his area that was sooo good. When Xavier visited DC I repaid the favor by taking him to a personal tour of George Washington's house a very hard to find tourist attraction to find if you are visiting from out of town with out a car. Also when we went to Portland a few months ago Huy who since moved to MEETinSeattle now drove us to see some awesome nature sites in Portland. my point being is we are a very small world. This shows just how connected we really are. The borders are slowly going away and Good deeds always come back to you :-)
So if you ever travel be sure to stop by your local MEETin you never know what awesome new friends you may meet.
( photo from MEETinLONDON happy hour we went to while in London - lots of new friends were met :-)
MEETin Spreading good deeds
Here is one example I love. One friend of ours Huy from MEETinBoise ( well he is a friend now since we met him in London ) was flying to Paris for the convention. He was in a bike accident before he left from Boise. I guess in flight to Paris his leg started to act up. he had to go to the hospital when he landed. Some of the MEETinParis people , people he never met in his life came to the hospital only after Huys girl friend post on the message he was stuck in the hospital. The hanged out with him in the hospital. How cool is that you go to a city and country to never met anyone and people come and visit you. When we arrived from DC my friend Charann had her credit card stopped. Our new friend ( Xavier ) from Paris not only brought us to his home to call for free America he also brought us to an awesome French restaurant in his area that was sooo good. When Xavier visited DC I repaid the favor by taking him to a personal tour of George Washington's house a very hard to find tourist attraction to find if you are visiting from out of town with out a car. Also when we went to Portland a few months ago Huy who since moved to MEETinSeattle now drove us to see some awesome nature sites in Portland. my point being is we are a very small world. This shows just how connected we really are. The borders are slowly going away and Good deeds always come back to you :-)
So if you ever travel be sure to stop by your local MEETin you never know what awesome new friends you may meet.
( photo from MEETinLONDON happy hour we went to while in London - lots of new friends were met :-)
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Public Art, Private Parts
I went to an art exhibit this weekend of a very good friend of mine I could say she is almost like a sister to me and B-dog a brother. You got to love extended family. But Ming is a fantastic artist with a wonderful soul. She is the first person I ever met in MEETin and in some ways Ming and Jamie are like my two MEETin sisters. B-dog also is a great artist and he made the movie. Check the video below if you want to see it. its really awesome. Anyways just wanted to say on here how proud I am of you guys and your work. You are true art lovers and you truly stuck to it and never gave up on your art. its a hard business to make it in so a huge congrads for keeping it real. I used to be an artist back in the day but now my art is building web pages. I know that sounds funny "web pages art" but i kind of see it that way :-) Art is simply a form of expression right. lol
( Photos Ming on left BBrandon on right )
Video of Mings work below
Another one of B-s movies below
( Photos Ming on left BBrandon on right )
Video of Mings work below
Another one of B-s movies below
Friday, January 19, 2007
Up In The Club
H2O
Ok I went out dancing in the club on Friday night. A place called H2O in dc here. I am not a big fan of this place. Last time I went to H2O I brought 275 of my friends hehe no I am not joking. Its a cool place but the guys are super aggressive here. Every single second you feel like your friends are being grabbed. Last time I was at the place I was trying to keep them off my one friends and literally had to block dudes hands from grabbing her ass to the point where he grabbed my hand. I felt like saying "how do you do sir" as if we were shaking. Anyways Friday was not as bad but one of the ladies with us definitely had to tell a guy off pretty much once ever 5 minutes or so. This was extremely funny. It was like watching them all line up to ask her out and she had to keep saying I am not here for a date just to dance.
Love to Dance
I truly do love to dance. I have never felt so alive then when I am dancing in the club with some good friends and some awesome music. I mean its almost like a high. I think this comes from when I was a kid I grew up in a mostly black area of San Francisco ( Fillmore area and HP [ Hunters Point ] School distract ). I used to go to the school dances and get down. This is one reason I love to throw big parties. I mean where else can you get a bunch of your friends all on the dance floor at the same time. I love that. Like at all of the big parties I throw dancing is just going to happen. We will always get the dance floor heated up every time. Let face it at big parties you can catch up with your friends a little but dancing is what's its all about. Anyways we did make it out of H2O. I think my friend Christine is going to drag me to out dancing again before I can catch my breath. I tell she is an awesome dancer and never seems to stop. I guess allot of the people I hang with really love dancing. Bonnie, Anji, Kavitha, Charann my brother Willi and Jay we all like to get up on the floor sooner or later and if we have not done it for a while you can get after the next happy hour we will be "UP IN THE CLUB" :-)
Ok I went out dancing in the club on Friday night. A place called H2O in dc here. I am not a big fan of this place. Last time I went to H2O I brought 275 of my friends hehe no I am not joking. Its a cool place but the guys are super aggressive here. Every single second you feel like your friends are being grabbed. Last time I was at the place I was trying to keep them off my one friends and literally had to block dudes hands from grabbing her ass to the point where he grabbed my hand. I felt like saying "how do you do sir" as if we were shaking. Anyways Friday was not as bad but one of the ladies with us definitely had to tell a guy off pretty much once ever 5 minutes or so. This was extremely funny. It was like watching them all line up to ask her out and she had to keep saying I am not here for a date just to dance.
Love to Dance
I truly do love to dance. I have never felt so alive then when I am dancing in the club with some good friends and some awesome music. I mean its almost like a high. I think this comes from when I was a kid I grew up in a mostly black area of San Francisco ( Fillmore area and HP [ Hunters Point ] School distract ). I used to go to the school dances and get down. This is one reason I love to throw big parties. I mean where else can you get a bunch of your friends all on the dance floor at the same time. I love that. Like at all of the big parties I throw dancing is just going to happen. We will always get the dance floor heated up every time. Let face it at big parties you can catch up with your friends a little but dancing is what's its all about. Anyways we did make it out of H2O. I think my friend Christine is going to drag me to out dancing again before I can catch my breath. I tell she is an awesome dancer and never seems to stop. I guess allot of the people I hang with really love dancing. Bonnie, Anji, Kavitha, Charann my brother Willi and Jay we all like to get up on the floor sooner or later and if we have not done it for a while you can get after the next happy hour we will be "UP IN THE CLUB" :-)
Monday, January 15, 2007
The Plane Goes Down
Our parents had it so much easier. They fell in love with someone they got married and live together forever. Real love, True love.
Our generation we hide our feeling and do not know how to love. We walk away from love because we are so scared of it. We are so scared of it that we feel we will fail so we never open up or event try.================================================
I'm leaving your town again love
But I'm over the quilt that you've spinning
And I'm up in the air, so baby hell yeah
Oh honey I can see your house from here
If the plane goes down, damn
I'll remember where the love was found
If the plane goes down, damn
You keep me high minded
You get me high
Flax seeds, well they tear me open
And supposedly you can crawl right through me
Taste these teeth please
And undress me from these sweaters better hurry
Cause I'm keeping upward bound now
Oh maybe I'll build my house in your cloud
Here I'm tumbling for you
Stumbling through the work that I have to do
Don't mean to harm you
By leaving your town again love
But I'm over the ground that you've been spinning
But I'm up in the air, said baby hell yeah
Oh honey I can see your house from here
If the plane goes down, damn
I'll remember where the love was found
If the plane goes down, damn
I'll remember where the love was found
If the plane goes down, damn
Well I'll remember where the love was found
If the plane goes down, damn
Who do you
Think you are, are, are, are
To keep me so oh cold, cold
You keep me high minded
You keep me high minded
You get me high minded
You get me high
By JASON MRAZ
Sunday, January 14, 2007
The Streets of New York / Inland Empire - David Lynch
The Streets of New York
Ok so today we have some fun things to do. Stopping by the "The Streets of New York" exhibit at the national gallery to see some photos taken back in the 30's and 50's. I love photography so this is right down my alley. I really like it. The photos were interesting. A couple of them were "Moved me" photos. These are photos I can really look into the persons eyes in the photos and maybe feel a little bit of what they felt like. Try to understand dreams , pain and maybe a little bit about their life. Their were a couple photos you could see no doubt.
Inland Empire - David Lynch
I went to see "Inland Empire " with Sharon. One thing i like about my friend Sharon she always thinks of really good movies to watch. This movie was very very strange. Why would someone expect less from David. I asked the guy sitting next to me if he knew what the movie was about he said "this is my second time seeing it and I have no idea". After seeing the movie I had a pretty good idea to what Dave was saying. I do not want to spoil it here so I will not but let me say this movie should have been cut down into 1.5 hours instead of 2 hours. To many repeats of the same person running down a hallways looking scared. Ok we get it she is scared she is running down a hallways with a hand chasing her. After the movie Dave Lynch came out and let members of the audience ask question about his movie making style. it was cool listening to him as he was humorous and had a very artsy way of looking at his film making. Would I say this movie was bad. I always say it depends what you like. Main stream American will never get into this type of art form but he has his fans and thats all that counts. I think the funnest part of it all is how much people kiss up to the people in the movie biz. Everyone wants to be a star. Not sure why but people seem to want to be in the lime light. As fare as I am concern you can take it. Why would you want people to never be real around you? I mean every acts so fake. He is just a person just like Brad Pitt or anyone else. It just kind of amuses me to see how people will act some times around "Famous people".
Ok so today we have some fun things to do. Stopping by the "The Streets of New York" exhibit at the national gallery to see some photos taken back in the 30's and 50's. I love photography so this is right down my alley. I really like it. The photos were interesting. A couple of them were "Moved me" photos. These are photos I can really look into the persons eyes in the photos and maybe feel a little bit of what they felt like. Try to understand dreams , pain and maybe a little bit about their life. Their were a couple photos you could see no doubt.
Inland Empire - David Lynch
I went to see "Inland Empire " with Sharon. One thing i like about my friend Sharon she always thinks of really good movies to watch. This movie was very very strange. Why would someone expect less from David. I asked the guy sitting next to me if he knew what the movie was about he said "this is my second time seeing it and I have no idea". After seeing the movie I had a pretty good idea to what Dave was saying. I do not want to spoil it here so I will not but let me say this movie should have been cut down into 1.5 hours instead of 2 hours. To many repeats of the same person running down a hallways looking scared. Ok we get it she is scared she is running down a hallways with a hand chasing her. After the movie Dave Lynch came out and let members of the audience ask question about his movie making style. it was cool listening to him as he was humorous and had a very artsy way of looking at his film making. Would I say this movie was bad. I always say it depends what you like. Main stream American will never get into this type of art form but he has his fans and thats all that counts. I think the funnest part of it all is how much people kiss up to the people in the movie biz. Everyone wants to be a star. Not sure why but people seem to want to be in the lime light. As fare as I am concern you can take it. Why would you want people to never be real around you? I mean every acts so fake. He is just a person just like Brad Pitt or anyone else. It just kind of amuses me to see how people will act some times around "Famous people".
About Me
WHY MY GRAMMAR SUCKS
Ok not going to go into a long life story because well its a long long story. I will explain really quickly my spelling is not so great. I started school at 13 after growing up on a farm and well at age 13 I could not read or write. That being said I am pretty much up to par with most others living and breathing in the real world but let's just say my grammar is not the best.
WHY I DECIDED TO WRITE A BLOG
I have been on the most amazing journey over the last 4 years. I wish I started this years ago. The stories I could tell. However I did not and so I must start now so at least I can capture some of my crazy adventures.
THE QUICK STORY OF MEETIN.ORG
I will have to write a longer story about MEETin.org but in order to understand allot of my adventures you would have to understand this crazy experiment called MEETin.org. The quick of it was I moved to DC from San Fran about 13 years ago. I moved to DC to escape a bad break up with my high school sweetheart. Let just say she found another guy why we were dating. Anyways back to MEETin I was like many who move looking to make some new friends and found it very hard to do so in the DC area. I knew there were many people like me out their but had no idea how to find them. I got involved in some yahoo groups some of them were very specific on where you had to come from in order to join others were more like posting boards where you may have little chance of meeting someone. I decided to start my own with a very simple rules set. If you posted an event you had to be there. This would cut out all of the people who were trying to promote some event but really had no intention on helping people make friends. Also all events had to be from ones heart in other words you can not profit from it. This means people will make friends with out the idea of profiting from it. So I set out to start a yahoo group called MEETinDC. This yahoo group blew up. I mean we had parties with hundreds of people we had happy hours with hundreds of people. Apparently there were many people in this city just like me. At this point I started 16 other yahoo groups including major cities like San Fran, LA, New York, Seattle , Portland and many more. This also grew and grew so much I had to build a site to bring all of these cities together. So I set out to build a site un-like any other site and MEETin.org was born. We call this a social experiment back then and I would still call it this today. I will refer to this experiment allot through out this blog. Some day I will have to write a book about this but ya with my writing its not likely lol.
Ok not going to go into a long life story because well its a long long story. I will explain really quickly my spelling is not so great. I started school at 13 after growing up on a farm and well at age 13 I could not read or write. That being said I am pretty much up to par with most others living and breathing in the real world but let's just say my grammar is not the best.
WHY I DECIDED TO WRITE A BLOG
I have been on the most amazing journey over the last 4 years. I wish I started this years ago. The stories I could tell. However I did not and so I must start now so at least I can capture some of my crazy adventures.
THE QUICK STORY OF MEETIN.ORG
I will have to write a longer story about MEETin.org but in order to understand allot of my adventures you would have to understand this crazy experiment called MEETin.org. The quick of it was I moved to DC from San Fran about 13 years ago. I moved to DC to escape a bad break up with my high school sweetheart. Let just say she found another guy why we were dating. Anyways back to MEETin I was like many who move looking to make some new friends and found it very hard to do so in the DC area. I knew there were many people like me out their but had no idea how to find them. I got involved in some yahoo groups some of them were very specific on where you had to come from in order to join others were more like posting boards where you may have little chance of meeting someone. I decided to start my own with a very simple rules set. If you posted an event you had to be there. This would cut out all of the people who were trying to promote some event but really had no intention on helping people make friends. Also all events had to be from ones heart in other words you can not profit from it. This means people will make friends with out the idea of profiting from it. So I set out to start a yahoo group called MEETinDC. This yahoo group blew up. I mean we had parties with hundreds of people we had happy hours with hundreds of people. Apparently there were many people in this city just like me. At this point I started 16 other yahoo groups including major cities like San Fran, LA, New York, Seattle , Portland and many more. This also grew and grew so much I had to build a site to bring all of these cities together. So I set out to build a site un-like any other site and MEETin.org was born. We call this a social experiment back then and I would still call it this today. I will refer to this experiment allot through out this blog. Some day I will have to write a book about this but ya with my writing its not likely lol.
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