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fruited plains


Happy fourth of July my friends, hope you’re all enjoying your freedom.

My pre-flight baby nerves proved to be unfounded – Keaton was a model plane-baby, sleeping soundly in mom’s lap for half the flight, and dad’s lap for the other half. She did so good, in fact, that I decided to put some new pictures of her up on the interweb. You can check them out here. If, after seventeen weeks watching this baby in pictures, you’re not convinced she’s #1 cute, you need your head checked. My wiener totally made that.

Monday in Florida, Sharaun and I went out to lunch with Kyle and Andy: hot wings and beer. Then, I left Sharaun with the baby for an afternoon of darts and pool at the local brewpub with the gents. Now, I didn’t overindulge on the beer – four or five pints at the most; but, we did manage to go through about a pack and a half of cigarettes in four hours. That, my friends, destroyed me; absolutely destroyed me. Later that night, I was home with a crushing headache, loathing the fact that no amount of soap could wash the smoke smell off my fingertips. I wallowed in pain until the wee hours, not able to get to sleep for the pounding in my head and the churning in my belly. Stupid stupid cigarettes, how many times will I curse them before I swear them off forever? Forever!

Before I go, I wanted to leave you with this gorgeous picture of a large sticker I saw on the tailgate of a truck here. Only in Florida, my friends, only in Florida.

Love ya, goodnight.

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the older, balding set


Thursday night, lawn’s mowed, burger’s been eaten, and Keaton just went down. If that succession of events isn’t telling enough, I’m once again on my own as Keaton’s sole parent tonight – mom had a “ladies only” dinner to attend so I took the munchkin. I don’t mind, as it gives me a chance to test some parenting theories that I’m not sure Sharaun would approve of. Nothing too Skinnerish, Scout’s Honor; just some things that I’ve thought about trying. For instance, tonight I proved myself correct on my “she can cry” theory. Sharaun has this little ritual she goes through when she puts Keaton down. She changes her diaper, swaddles her lower body, and lies down in bed with her to sing her to sleep – it’s an endearing practice, and completely befitting of a mom-daughter relationship.

My method, however, is more dad-like. See, I mentioned before that Keaton often doesn’t like going down to bed – and begins to cry and thrash just as sleep overtakes her. I decided that this must be part of her normal “thing,” and even surmised that my immediate attention upon her first tears might even hinder her eventual slumber. So, tonight I just let her work it out. She cried, she thrashed, even spit out her pacifier. But you know what? It lasted all of five minutes and then she was out. She cried right through that sleep-hesitation and drifted off to dreamland with nary a dad popping in the room to stuff her pacifier back in or pick her up. Because of this, I now consider myself a natural father – destined to go down in the annals of fatherhood, probably on the pages between Ward Cleaver, Mike Brady, and Andy Griffith. Can I get an amen?

As you read this Friday’s sand is running low, and our little family is readying for a long trip “home” to Florida. I’ll be honest, it’s after 9pm now on Thursday night and I haven’t packed a lick… haven’t even really began thinking about what I want to bring. It’s OK though, because I’m a pretty low-key packer – I figure if I forget it, I can always buy it. Traveling, however, is another deal altogether… I’m sweating and uptight just thinking about it. Compound that with my fears of Keaton screaming the entire overnight flight to Florida… and I think I qualify for a ‘lude or two. But, I’m not sweatin’ it y’allz… not a bit. I’ll have plenty of time to pack up my goods tomorrow after work before leaving for the airport. That’s how I roll.

I wrote Ben an e-mail today to tell him how addicted I am to this Figurines album, Skeleton. Seriously, this album is gorgeous. The soft piano opener had me expecting something different than what’s just a cut deeper – great bouncy rock with solid lyrics. Funny thing is, listening to this album for the past two days straight, I would’ve easily pegged these guys as red-blooded, Budweiser-swillin’ Americans. Turns out the band hails from Denmark. Who would’ve guessed? But seriously, go out and illegally download this album – you won’t regret stealing it one bit, it’s totally worth no effort. And just think, I missed these guys playing only hours from here just a couple weeks ago – and with the Tapes ‘n Tapes and Cold War Kids… it’s like a music blog porno that concert; thick-rimmed shaggy-hairs must’ve been creaming their too-tight worn jeans at that lineup. Wish I could’ve been there representing the older, balding set. Anyway, this song, in particular, has kept my ears happy over and over again… give a listen.

Holy shit people, a man gives his fortune to help the sick of the world and you compare him to a Nazi? Have you die-hards been so brainwashed that your principles are that misaligned with human nature? Take off your blinders you sheep, try evaluating things on a scale of good vs. bad instead of Pat Robertson vs. Michael Moore. Somethings don’t have “sides” you can take, somethings are just good. In this age of materialism, why ruin such a selfless act by dragging it into that ring? Just put your agenda down, shut the fuck up, thank people for caring about other people, and be on your ignorant way.

Love ya all. Not sure what my blogging schedule will be like next week, vacations are always iffy in terms of posting regularity. Goodnight.

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roll it over


Let the pre-vacation preparation blitz begin. Today it’s returning some merch to Home Depot, cashing some checks, paying some bills, and getting a haircut. Tomorrow is mowing the front and back lawn, pulling some new-growth weeds, and fertilizing. Still have to sign up some sucker to come empty the cat’s litter box and give her food and water, as well as pack.

I don’t have much tonight, but I did finish the video I was working on. Showcasing our lovely daughter’s new talent, rolling over! Surf on over to the gallery and watch it right here.

Speaking of Keaton, she had her first fever tonight. A mild 100.3° F, which the internet told me can be in the “normal” range for babies. Once again, I fall back on my “nothing is certain” rule when it comes to babies – everything can be “normal” with them. Either way, we kept track for an hour or so and it went back down under 100° pretty quickly. Hopefully it’s not a virus or anything, as I wouldn’t want to experience that “first” as we’re traveling to Florida for vacation… Get well soon Keaton!

Goodnight.

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she get high


Good Tuesday evening folks, glad to be with you again. Guess what? My daughter rolled over for the first time yesterday. You know me, I’m hard at work on a cheesy video celebrating the event.

Recently, I scanned through my iPod looking for ways to condense down the content and make room for new stuff. Not that it’s completely overflowing, but I’m just not a fan of excess. Anyway, I decided that, rather than having the entire remastered Doors discography, I could live with just a hand-assembled collection of my favorite Door songs (because, honestly, who can listen to “Horse Latitudes” all the way through anyway?). So, I hand-picked some songs and put together “Dave’s Picks,” a Doors greatest hits collection tailor made for me. I was so proud of myself and the 30 megs I saved, that I played the new compilation on the way to work this morning. And y’know what, I discovered that I’ve been listening to the Wal Mart version of the Doors my entire life. used to only the versions on the Columbia House version of the double disc Doors greatest hits set I was weaned on, and in fact not even aware there were other versions, how shocked do you think I was when I heard Jim Morrison say:

She get high! She get high! She get high, yeeeaaahhh!

Instead of the (now obviously truncated) sounding:

“She get ____, she get ____, she get ____, yeeeaaahhh!”

I can’t believe I never noticed the odd gaps in the lyrics, it’s so “… she ain’t messin’ with no broke-broke” sounding. And, all that Oedipal innuendo I always had to imagine at the end of “The End” is just out there in all it’s incestuous glory, as Mr. Mojo Risin’ follows up the suggestive “Mother, I want to… ooooohaaauurgh… night loooong!” line by breaking into a sort of F-word scat. Letting loose a bouncy chorus of “Fuck-a-fuck, fuck me baby, fuck, fuck…” Man, I’m ashamed to say that I didn’t know these songs in their full socially defiant beauty until this, the year of our Lord, two-thousand naught-six. Shame on me, shame shame.

Know what though, I decided to look it up – and it turns out the unedited version of these songs never even saw the light of day until six years ago when they were released on the 2000 remasters (the very albums from which I culled my compilation). So, I don’t feel so bad – these songs existed only in butchered form since they were released on wax way back in ’67. Whew. No shame on me, no shame no shame.

On our honeymoon, Sharaun and I saw a young girl get hit by a car. Maybe 15 or 16 years old, the girl was walking along the side of the road with her family. Sharaun and I were on the other side of the road riding our rented bicycles from one side of the island to the other. We had just passed the family as they walked opposite us when I heard the car skid. Next came a loud sound of impact, and I stopped my bike and turned my head just in time to see the girl’s body come over the car. She looked like a ragdoll in the air, every muscle limp as she tumbled above the trunk. She hit the ground in a violent collapse, her head the last thing to stop moving, neck offering no resistance as it landed on the hard packed dirt with a disgusting hollow sound. The car was already stopped, maybe 10ft in front of where the girl’s body now lay – motionless. I could see the smashed windshield through the rear window.

I’d never seen anything like that before, and I feared that I’d just watched a girl die in front of me. Sharaun and I were somewhat in shock, our eyes riveted to the scene while others rushed to dial 911 on cellphones and began to cross the street. The girl’s family was in a frenzy, one of them, who I took to her sister, was wailing. She repeated it over and over again in an agonizing cry as she bent over the girl, I’ll never forget that island accent calling out that name. The driver of the vehicle has since stepped out and was in a state of breakdown herself. A young girl, likely only a few years older than the girl now laying in the dirt, she was crying violently and looked positively lost for what to do. Then, not 20 seconds after the whole thing transpired, the young girl on the ground began to stir. Appearing dazed at first, she then became quite alert and even got to her feet. After that impact, I could hardly believe it.

Bystanders urged the girl to sit back down, not to move – but she and her family were stubbornly already trying to move on, the girl actually up and moving away from the scene. I remember thinking it was so odd, and that this young woman must have internal injuries. As we began to hear the approaching wail of sirens, we decided to move on. I still remember the terrible feeling I had in my gut as the crash played out in my mind during the remainder of the ride. I kept wondering just how hurt that girl was, despite her seemingly miraculous recovery. Kept imagining how her life may have changed that day, or may have not. Scary, sad, sickening, and fascinating.

I remember putting the Band of Horses album everyone’s talking about on my iPod way yonder back, maybe even two months ago. I must have decided, back then, that I didn’t really dig the album – because it’s since been removed from the iPod and my music library proper. I don’t know what was wrong with me, because this album is truly good. So good, in fact, that it’s now back on the iPod and in heavy rotation. Stupid me for getting rid of it in the first place.

Oh! Oh! Oh! Remember just the other day when I was pining for some scrap of news about the Arcade Fire’s sophomore album? Look! It’s like the Fire read my blog and are talking just to me! Fifteen songs! A pipe organ! C’mon Arcade Fire, pleeeease do it again, pleeease!

And, to finish off this music news hat-trick – I noticed that Cokemachineglow ripped off my Best of 2006.5 idea with their own half-year best of, the major difference being theirs has better written metaphors and more germane imagery. Also, they picked some albums that I personally feel are crap. I just can’t get into that Danielson LP, I hate everything the Fiery Furnaces ever put on wax, and that Love is All record was an overrated piece of trash. I do, however, agree with them on the albums that we chose in common – and I’m busily “perusing” the ones I hadn’t heard of.

Goodnight.

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verdant billboards


Welcome one, welcome all – to the sounds familiar blog. Now with recent-fad relevancy! Sounds familiar is your one-stop-shop for online predator sting operations, drifting, black-haired Britney, and the World Cup.

I don’t feel like I’ve been doing any “good” writing of late. That “Lion” bit the other day was some attempt to make myself feel good about my writing again – to move this blog out of the “went here, did that, had fun” doldrums and bring it back to something a little more interesting. To renew the storytelling aspect, maybe focus a little more on the writing and less on the material (if that even makes sense). I really do enjoy flattering myself by trying to “write good.” I get happy if my words flow well, if the sentences bring across ideas with unique words or interesting structure. I do abuse punctuation, and love a good run-on, but it’s the way my mind likes to see its thoughts put on paper. I can’t promise much, as my writing tends to reflect my mood, and is always a struggle between how badly I want to get the thought down vs. how pretty I want it to sound.

Slightly related, I had another friend ask me the other day how much time “blogging” takes me, “How much time per day,” he asked. I’ve been asked before, and I never have a really solid answer – I suppose because I just don’t think about it too much. This time, the curious friend asked if it was something I had to consciously work at or if it was now a firmly entrenched habit. I guess that one is easier to answer than the “how much time” one, as I’m fairly certain this blogging thing is definitely now a habit – nay, a compulsion, obsession. Even on the days I don’t write, it’s not because I don’t want to write – I always want to write. I don’t write because there’s just nothing I can bring myself to write about, and what’s more I actually feel bad about it. I’ve come to take pride in posting regularly, and more than fearing a disappointed audience, I don’t like breaking my “streak.” Anyway… back to the question of time-spent.

I’d guess I spend, on average, and hour and a half each day blogging. Sometimes less, sometimes more. I write mostly in the evening, while Sharaun and I sit and watch TV. Sometimes, I’ve snuck online during the workday and scribbled down thoughts in outline form, or set a fragmented sentence “to-blog” reminder to pop up on my cellphone and jog my memory. If the mood is right, it doesn’t take long at all. I can knock out several well-formed paragraphs in under a half hour. In fact, sometimes I get to writing so much that a good portion of the stuff ends up in the pre-written “bin” to post later when I’m not so inspired. I usually get an entry done and then spend an amount of time equal to actually writing it in reviewing and touching it up. Fixing sentence structure, flow, spelling, etc. Lastly, I surf the ‘net looking for an appropriate picture to accompany it, upload, format, and hit “publish.”

I like to think about it like this: Were I just taking those couple hours and watching some TV, it’d be two hours out of each day I’d never be able to get back. Spending those two hours writing, I feel like I can get some of that back – by way of reading what those two hours produced at some later date. I can at least revisit the thoughts I took time to put down. I’m going to stop writing this now.

When I was a kid, we had sycamore trees around our hometown. Those familiar with California sycamore trees will likely know what I mean when I say they had the coolest “puzzle-piece” bark. Instead of a solid sheath of bark like standard trees have, these trees had a protective outer shell made up of little cobblestones of hard bark. Being boys, we loved to pick at these scabby things, pulling off the amoeba-shaped flakes of bark to expose the bright yellow-green skin underneath. I can remember staring at trunk and limbs of the tree, looking for potential patterns; purposely trying to pull off the little puzzle pieces to leave behind a green secret message. The tree’s soft layer of protected skin used as a verdant billboard, perhaps advertising the vandal’s name or favorite four-letter word. Sure, the letters were often bubbly and imperfect, but if you took a long hard look at the sycamores in my neighborhood – you’d likely find one or two with a large green D-A-V-E picked off vertically down its trunk.

So… somehow I ended up at an old Stereogum post the other day, one centered on a Hilary Duff photoshopping contest. And, reading through the comments I found this gem tucked away at the very bottom:

HILARY THIS IS KATE. I AM A HUGE FAN I DO NOT WANT YOU TO BECOME ANOREXIA YOU ARE MY ROLE MODEL, YOUR PRETTY YOU ALSO HAVE A WOUNDERFUL VOCIE AND I DO NOT WANT YOU DIE. PLEASE DONT BE ANOREXIA BECAUSE I KNOW THERE ARE MANY MORE FANS THEN JUST ME WHO LIKE YOU AND FEEL THE SAME WAY. SO PLEASE DONT CONTENUE TO BE ANOREXIA
GET BETTER SOON
YOUR FAN KATE R WRITE BACK

Excellent. You hear that, Hil? Don’t be anorexia, OK? Reminds me of some of the fan “mail” I’ve gotten on my ? and the Mysterians page.

Goodnight.

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lion’s paws are made of rubber


An action-packed weekend, that’s what it was. Yup… action-packed. Saturday we woke up early to get some professional-type photos taken of our burgeoning family. I claimed Keaton post-photos so mom could join friends on a rafting trip down the river. Meanwhile, while her mom lazed her way downstream, Keaton and I headed over to a friend’s place to watch Mexico and Argentina foot it out on the pitch. Later, the family reunited briefly at the follow-up to rafting – a backyard BBQ. Then it was mom’s turn to fly solo with Lil’ Chino, as dad joined some of his friends and headed up the mountain to do some skywatching. Anthony bought a fancy telescope and four of us headed up into the darkness of the mountains, escaping the light-polluted city, to gaze aloft. And, although the watching part was, for the most part, obscured by clouds, it was nice; especially since I’d had the presence of mind to fill my hip flask to the brim with a stout port before leaving. Seven ounces of that stuff will do a body right over the course of a night, y’know. Sunday we spent the day with friends, chowed on grilled salmon and mashed ‘taters… we have a hard, hard life.

And, even in the midst of packing all that action, I was able to upload a small set of pictures to Keaton’s Gallery. Check them out here, and watch as Keaton finally truly “discovers” her feet, and takes her first swim with mom.

Lion: Lion’s paws are made of rubber; primary colors: red, blue, yellow, and green. Lion has beans in his belly and rocks in his head. His purple mane crinkles. Lion is covered in invisible DNA, dried spit. His limbs sag under the weight of his oversized hands and feet, but he can sit up on his own and he never fails to get a smile. Lion goes places; lion is a man on the move; lion’s on the move.

Goodnight.

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the sandman always wins


Thursday night and still coming down from a triumphant sprinkler repair earlier this evening. For dinner, Sharaun got all adventurous and made turkey and cheese sandwiches with blackberry jam on powdered-sugar topped waffles. Some kind of bastardized take on the Monte Cristo, but it was excellent and made my belly feel good. She and Keaton are back in the bedroom doing Keaton’s bedtime routine; I can hear Keaton crying from here, she must really be fighting it tonight. That’s a funny thing about babies, at least ours: how she seems to not want to go to sleep, despite being obviously tired. She’ll begin to drift off, her eyes will start to close, and she’ll bolt awake and begin crying – almost like she’s mad at herself for nearly losing the battle with the Sandman. Maybe it’s a kid thing, I can remember nearly always asking for an extra few minutes when my bedtime rolled around – never wanting to go to bed at the appointed hour. Now, man… I cherish my sleep.

Ever since I started thinking towards Halloween the other day, it’s been on my mind a lot. Each Halloween, I customarily get one “big ticket” item. Last year it was my air compressor, the year before it was the ridiculously overpowered fog machine, and this year I think I know what I want. Since my two new prop ideas are relatively inexpensive, I’m thinking of getting a real-deal prop timer system. The picoBoo looks awesomely promising. There are three different models, the major differentiators being the ability to record and playback audio and whether or not you want AC or DC outputs. To me, the the low-end model with DC outputs and no sound seems like a good option as the models with sound only have line out and still need to be amped, and they tout the audio quality as “similar to AM radio.” Prop activation and timing has always been a tough nut to crack, and I’ve always wanted a real-time programmer – this may just be the year to take the plunge. Oh, and by the way, all the talk of the ghosts of Halloween past and future made me nostalgic for the old “teaser” videos I’ve made. So, I put up a section in the Halloween galleries dedicated to past teaser videos, enjoy it here.

I have nothing more to write, g’night.