Light a man on fire and he’ll be warm for the rest of his life.

It continually amazes me that after a moment of insight what was once so mundane and typical is transformed to odd and Jamais vu*.

Picture from www.illustratorworld.com

*(French: “never seen” opposite of Deja vu)

“Nothing in life is to be feared. It is only to be understood.” -Marie Curie

My most recent insights have been from an educational film from a Professor at the University of Massachusetts named Sut Jhally . I watched a graphic but extremely enlightening interpretation of how the media (particularly the Music/Music Video Industry) and our culture are intertwined and interact. The film is called Dreamworlds 3.

The film discusses how music videos have moved from a cultural fringe to the mainstream, and how this change has effected our society in the form of cultural stories and cultural acceptability. The film shows footage of riots and group molestations caught on film and the startling, almost exact, similarities in some music videos.

The most moving and, and to be honest, the most disgusting part of the film discusses how the objectification of women in the media (in the makers opinion) is changing the inner understanding of how young girls view themselves and the world.

I would suggest it to any adult.

This film deals with subjects and content that is not for children or adolescents.

The film brings a type of accountably and rational that I have sensed lacking from our “mainstream” media. We should be holding makers and broadcasters of this content accountable for what they are encouraging.

This is you Viacom (in the form of MTV and BET), Sony BMG, Warner, and Universal.

Watch at your own risk, anything you watch.

Thank you Mr. Sut Jhally. I appreciate your thoughts.

So you would think that with 2 weeks off of work that I would find some more time to be on-line and write… WRONG!

I have way too many things that I think I want to do. Besides reading Bram Stokers Dracula, purchasing and installing a new over-the-range microwave and Refrigerator (not over-the-range, silly rabbit), and installing Gusty on my lappy (thanks Karl); I have decide I need to learn how to be a “real man” and install tile. My buddie Dustin is the king of all that is know as “building” and so I recruited him to help me because I have never done anything like this before.

The back bathroom in our condo has been crying to me for a while now and all it talks about it tile. So I said, “Damn you bathroom, if I give it to you will you leave me alone!…” It agreed and I started.

As some of you have noticed by now I must have a Mohawk when working on projects.

After the walls were stripped of their precious Sheetrock, they received the new Hardybacker with all the love and tenderness that a child can give a parent. And with a whine asked when it was going to get its tile. Walls are so impatient.

As my Yachting partner Mac-tastic blurted out when she saw it, we have a brick pattern on the walls with a windmill on the floor. The product is Slate from Lowes. Oh, Lowes how you make my projects accessible.

Well, I am about a week out from grouting with what I have left to put up, plus the Grand mal seizure of a holiday that is Christmas, and our little trip to Cali for 4 days. Hopefully it will be done before the new Semester. (Thats right I have a bachelors and I’m going back for more undergraduate work, in one word- Masochistic.)

Let me show you. Check it outs hotts kidss.  

The Band: A Sweet Bitter Winter 

How you pick me up when I’m down!

Good job Sir Mike.