Thank you Nathan [Black] for the accurate portrayal.

No, seriously... that's pretty accurate.



http://www.flickr.com/photos/lyleb/show/

Do What You Love. Don't Do What You Don't Love.

"Is that a quote from Jake's on Main?"

"Man, you're good. I always get caught when I use other people's originality and wittiness and try to make it my own.... But just for the record, that second part was all me."

"Zing!"

Blackberries are not to be trusted. They have stirred up a double dose of trouble and love. A first kiss and an... engagement. That's right. I'm getting a brother-in-law.

Without warning, a massive thunderstorm swept over the roof of my house in the middle of recording "Portland on a Train". I'm keeping it.

"Headed towards the great unknown for a walk in the rain."

And then for good measure, I kept recording the next twenty minutes of the frantic breaking-down of patio furniture and downpour occuring outside my bedroom window.

I've always found it odd that creatures are so incredibly attracted to light. Take the gnat on my computer screen right now. I've tried flicking him off at least five times, but he always keeps coming back for more. And I don't think it was the flicking. Or take the moth that literally commited suicide in the campfire last week out of an inability to say no to the beauty of the flame. I completely understand the idea of being attracted to light for the sake of making life easier [like how I turn on the light when I enter a room], but I do not understand spending two hours sitting on a computer screen or sacrificing my one and only life for the sake of a millisecond of pure bliss. There's something bigger going on with this whole light thing.

Crickets chirp in the background of "Cigarettes". It's beautiful and gives hope to my clock situation.

Speaking of "clock situation"... the current clock situation is telling me I have to be up for a shoot in seven hours. My beautifully ironic wake up call for sleep.

Two Hours of Driving. Twenty Minutes of Blackberry Picking.

And walking through what looked like a ghost town county fair with my pigtail braids and bucket in hand, everyone so in love [except for me], I declare "I'm gonna go get me a man."

But alas, the only man to be found was Mr. Red Shirt who was doing a very poor job at enforcing the rule of keeping the pickers from eating un-paid-for berries straight off the vine.

Eh, who am I kidding? I don't even want a man. I do, however, now want to go eat some more blackberries.

Citronella Candles From the Patio Placed All Over the Kitchen

I appologize for the unidentifiable nature of a few of these:

a guitar, a door [some days, you just gotta get some doors], tobacco pipe, banana, cup of coffee, yours truly, Nathan, brain [the future Socrates], bicycle [which was going to have an "x" through it, but that's kind of morbid...], tomato, bird [droppin' our food for the birds on the ground], and the Picasso's sign

Oh, the people that remind me of the important things!

There's a surreality that comes with a darkened restaurant, fifteen minutes before closing time. Citronella candles from the patio placed all over the kitchen, raising the temperature of an already unair-conditioned building. Trying to distinguish pink from white from yellow over the glow of an unallowed cell phone [overlooked tonight]. A couple of crying children. A couple of hysterical security guards. Just after a [hard] goodbye. The day before my last.

Learning to Crochet Over Chocolate Chip Pancakes.

We were undoubtedly the most attractive ones at IHOP. Especially moreso than the scene kid in the corner who never got off his cell phone and had the same haircut Aimee had in seventh grade. You know which one I'm talking about.

Nathan and I rang in his twentieth year with Seinfeld and teddy grams. But not until we discovered that my car stops going at 393 miles.

I have this horrible concept planted in my head. When I was a child, my father had an old Ford truck from 1981. The needle on the gas gauge was never over the E. Never. Either it didn't work, or he was one of those people that would just put a little a gas in every day, never to fork out more than five dollars at any given trip to the seven-eleven. Either way, I never really was able to fully grasp the idea that past the E would actually cause your vehicle to cease the rolling of its tires and the turning of its engine.

Until tonight. [Live and learn, but watch for speeding cars as you awkwardly fumble with the red can. I would hate for you to die the day before your birthday.]

At the beginning of the summer, Aimee planted sunflowers. Now, the shortest of the bunch is eight feet tall and the head weighs more than a small dog. The remains of one that was too heavy for its own good lays on our deck, the seeds half harvested and the carcass rotting away in the ninety eight degree weather. To make a long story short, I feel that sunflowers are not only offensively large and gruesome, but we also have plenty of sunflower seeds if anyone wants any.

It's getting close, and it's starting to feel real. So real that today, I bought silverware.

And Friday starts my last Friday [and so forth].

It Doesn't Surprise Me, But It Keeps Me Up Anyway

Can't sleep.

It's chai and recording logistics for me.

Or I could just eat the book that holds the plan.

Meh.

We used everything we brought and didn't need anything we didn't have.

this week. [yes, that's my salvaged foam]



I've drunken sixteen cups of chai, spent twenty consecutive hours in the wilderness, and locked myself in my bathroom to record seven hours every night.

I've mended five old frienships, slept a full six hours every night, and [nearly] finished two whole songs.

I've gotten overwhelmingly confused only once, broken only three guitar strings, ruined only one relationship, and had only four manic episodes.

Alright... five.

[switching lenses until the scenery changes]