The Cone Zone

This morning was normal. I got up at 6:00, drove to work, made coffee and such and then clocked out. The afternoon however involved a quick drive to a place that by Central Texas standards is far from normal.

It's a place known as the Lost Pines in Bastrop County about a half-hour east of the city. It's name is derived from the fact that there is no really good reason for a sizeable forest of pine trees to exist in this part of the state...at least a couple hundred miles from the nearest rational pine forest. Apparently the soil there is just unusually conductive to the growth of thousands of beautiful pine trees, and even allows them to survive the periodic drought that affects Central Texas.

The idea to make the afternoon trip came from a recently aquanted friend of mine named Vince. On the drive back into Austin we coined the term "cone zone" as a way to describe this ecological anomaly. He just moved here from the other side of the country and I am excited because I have a chance to really make the transition to Central Texas life a cool one for him and to kind of be this dude's personal tour guide. I like being a tour guide, I'm a natural at it...I just don't think I would enjoy being a guide on the same tour every day. I'm just not the type to stay in one place for long.

But that's exactly the state that I find myself in.

I Am Obsessed with the new MewithoutYou Album

This piece of pure artistic beauty, known more commonly as "Brother, Sister" by MewithoutYou, came out last month and I continue to listen to it obsessively...right now actually.



I've always appreciated MewithoutYou. Creative, eccentric, great in concert, thought provoking, and of course...rad. However, this album has significantly elevated them in my estimation. I am already certian that I like this album even more than their much loved (by me, and anyone else with a soul that has heard it) [A -> B] Life. That album is in my top ten of all time, which means this album is likely to sqeeze in there as well. I've actually never truly defined my top ten favorite albums of all time...but I have probably said that at least 17 or so albums are in my "top ten".

In the freaking name of all that is holy...I really like this album, a lot. So much that I put the new Mars Volta aside in order to become properly obsessed with this album.

I recently went out of state on a road trip with a couple of close friends (who also happen to be similarly obsessed...or even more obsessed..with this band...so the new stuff got a couple of quality spins and even made driving across Oklahoma somewhat bareable.

It was even playing in two other cars over the weekend...unsolicited by eagerly appreciated by myself.

To make things even better, they're coming to Austin on the 26th with Piebald. The downside is that they are not headlining...not only that, but they're opening for a band that I don't particularly like...but oh well, I'm going anyway and I'm as excited as I have been for a show since Lagwagon...and only because I had never seen Lagwagon and I've seen MwY twice...but it's been at least a couple of years or so...or 18 months...or something...too long.

Buy this album, or at least listen to it, or just check out the website or something.

The Theoretical End of Summer and Other Observations

Because I like to observe things.

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The Weather: What a change. After spending the majority of the first half of October in or near the 90's...a cold front moved though (with a lot of rain, which was interesting in itself) and today's high temperature...with sunny skies...was only 70 degrees. Unreal. "Sweater weather" for Austin in October. Supposedly we're finally done with the 90's...which is nice except I've already heard that a couple of times already this month.

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I've become frustated (again) with the overall political debate...the shallowness, or the lack thereof. Shallow advertisments attacking donors, vague accusations of corruption, the conversational marginalization of the Iraq war and the incredible and increasingly uncessary suffering of both troops and innocents overseas and the refusal of the increasingly totalitarianistic White House to face any sort of anything remotely resembling reality on the issue...even with the pure greed ridden and perhaps evil intentions of several cabnet members exposed on a near-daily basis.

When you have the two sides arguing over how many hundreds of thousands of civilians have actually died since the U.S. invasion and subsequent Civil War...er...sectarian violence...then something is really messed up with the fabric of our political society. By the way the U.S. troop death count is now over 2,800...but that's only 6 to 7 times the size of congress...mabye putting it in that context would help them understand things since it's hard to see outside of that big and comfortable building.

But of course I'm not trying to downplay the deaths of our own troops...it's tragic...I know people that are/have been over there...it would be helpful if Bush did as well.

"So you're saying we should put Saddam Hussein back in power?"

Shut up.

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Just because "9/11 was an inside job" makes for a catchy bumper sticker, doesn't mean it isin't a really really really laughable conspiracy theory when you factor in things like reality. That said...I do believe that 9/11 was a good coincidence as a political bullying tool...even a happy one...for certian people in the White House such a Donald "Let's invade Iraq before going after Al Queda in Afganistan" Rumsfeld.

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Save Darfur? Why should we care, they don't have any oil or political clout. Saving thousands of lives there wouldn't make the price of gas go down and make it cheaper to fill up our H2's...so we can all afford to add that third story onto our six bedroom houses.

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If you're in Texas...I would recommend voting for the following people before Rick Perry for Governor:

- Chris Bell
- Kinky Friedman
- Marc Katz (the deli guy)
- Willie Nelson
- Kirk Watson
- Tony Sanchez
- James Werner ("the libertarian guy", as I called him in person, it was embarrasing)
- Selina (would still do more good than Perry despite not living)
- Bill Parcells
- The ghost of Cesar Chavez
- Joel Osteen (only slightly less evil than Perry)
- Leslie
- Manu Ginoblli
- Chuck Norris
- Cedric Bixler-Zavala
- The "Rich Texan" on the Simpsons
- And I guess "Grandma" Strayhorn...but only if the Rich Texan is invalidated on the basis of being a cartoon character

Me Myself and I

I am self-absorbed. So self-absorbed that I have almost become unable to think of others or of ways to help them. I had a well-timed conversation with a friend that brought this to light in my head. Here I am writing about myself to prove it.

When you seek independence you get it...and when you do...be ready to not do anything for anybody else until you begin to pull away from that selfish desire.

We were made to be in community. Always in community. Never alone. Never truly in charge.

People are Awesome

There is something amazing in my life that I am not nearly thankful enough for. That would be the unfathomably cool but geographically group of people in my known as my good friends.

These people bring so much joy into my life...sometimes God even speaks to me though them...sometimes to them through me. I would be skeptical of what I just said if it wasn't for the fact that I have such a bond with certian people that I cannot explain.

Some are here in the Austin/San Marcos area...others in other parts of the state...others still at a small school in the middle of nowhere...and yet others scattered across the North America.

I often daydream that we could all be in one place...just us...just hanging out all the time and laughing and enjoying each others company week after week. I was thinking about this on the way back from a recent trip to visit one of my best friends and several other people who are good friends that I've met though him. I was thinking about it when I realized that that idea is the closest that I have ever been to envisioning heaven.

It's Gonna Rain!

It rained this morning in Austin...first substantial...or even measurable rainfall that we've had since July 6....over 50 days of dry and scorching (97-104 F) weather. The first signficant change in the weather pattern in two months also marks a signicant change in my life. During the entire dry spell I lived with two other guys in a modest and very blue house in my favorite neighborhood in Austin (Bouldin Creek)...suddenly I find myself moving from a neighborhood full of "hippies" to one full of mostly fratastic college students...University of Texas students to be exact. I am not a U.T. student...I'm still having a hard time actually accepting that I'm not a student at all..I'm in between college and career and it is akward. I have a good job with good people that pays my bills and I am recovering from the financial crap-storm that kicked off my summer but I'm still feeling like I've not fully recovered.

About a month ago, not knowing where I would live after this summer now that I had a job...I got a message from my friend Rob Slater, a U.T. student, that his apartment needed a fourth roommate. After first balking at the considerably high West Campus rent I realized that my share would actually not be much higher than what I was already paying due to the number of people in the apartment as well as much lower utility costs than I had in the rickety house on Boudlin Avenue. Also...for the first time since Spring I would be in a place with someone that I knew well and would be around often enough to create a mutual spiritual and emotional support structure that I hadn't really had during the summer. People are importiant to me because I learn from them. I am cynical and stubborn to the point that I almost can only learn and accept new things, as well as criticism, from those who I let really close to me...mainly my twenty or so closest friends who are either concentrated in San Marcos or spread across the country.

The fact that only a few tenths of an inch of rain fell during the past 10 weeks is symbolic to me of my own spiritual life...and emotional life as well. I haven't felt much, or sensed much during that time. Summer was indeed a dry spell for me in a number of ways. At one point, almost overwhelmed by loneliness and at others attacked by angst and frustration with God, my fellow man, and myself. I don't think that moving into a new place, or different weather for that matter in itself represents a positive change but I do think that it is highly conincidental with the representation I feel it has for what is about to happen in my life. During the past few years I could see my life "one year from now"...but that has completely clouded up and I have no idea where I am going nor do I sense that I have all that much control over it...like driving in neutral...not always a bad thing really...allthough to me it can often be frustrating.

But ultimately, even though my immediate career plans didn't work out, I was constantly reminded of grace and love though my friends. They, not the fact that I love Austin or that I am comfortable in the region where I spent almost all of my childhood, are the number one reason why I have stayed close instead of immediately seeking out a career in the media elsewhere. I've said it's because I didn't have the resources to start a big job search (which was primarily true for much of the summer)...but that doesn't tell the entire story...or even an importiant part of it. I don't know if I have ever conveyed that because the emotions behind that thought are explosive and overwhelming. I love the people that God has placed in my life and I hope that I never forget how to show it.

- Jordan

Class War? Mabye. Class Conflict...Certainly

The 90's were a good decade...for most. The Economy was booming, we weren't (seriously) at war with anybody and the news media didn't have to concern itself with massive widespread corruption allegations of congressional and business leaders alike. They were thus able to properly carpet their schedules with O.J. Simpson or the Clinton perjury question and subsequent impeachment trial that followed (which, for those of you just graduating public high school in America...is what "subsequent" means).

Most importiant to my current topic of discussion...was the visable absense of a "class-war". With an expanding middle-class and the greater overall realization of the so-called "American Dream" (construed by the middle class as advancement to the upper class...and by the lower class as advancement to the middle). Their seemed to be less emnity toward the rich and more hope among the poor (allthough things were not great for all of course). This led to many politicians on the left pulling more to the center on economic issues because American's widely percieved that what was good for the rich was also good for them.

This perception is quickly eroding today among both the working and middle classes (who also work...and increasingly harder in order to avoid dropping down the socio-economic ladder). The 35 percent (give or take a few points from week to week) job approval rating of our current fiscally conservative president are just one of many indicators that poor and middle class Americans view the health of the economy (as it relates to them) and their overall chances of financial success and well-being of their familes in an increasingly pessimistic light. Simply starting an increasingly unpopular war is not on its own enough to derail a president's support. The American people seemingly are less trusting in the White House and Congress to have their best interests at heart.

It began in the late 90's when working Americans everywhere found themselves shocked by the collapse of Enron and the allegations that surfaced of a few greedy executives orchestrating massive financial misdeeds and damaging the livelihoods of thousands of workers. Even the half-hearted attempt of Washington and local governments to go after so-called "White collar crime" following similar allegations waged at executives in other companies was enough to gain the average worker's attention. This translated to a growing distrust of the average American worker of the mantra that the rich people who are currently in charge of the American Dream Inc. have their best interests at heart. This is a striking and potentially positive trend as it appears that those at the top of the corporate world did not (and still do not today) deserve the trust and credit they were given by the average American.

Today more Americans, correct in their cynicism, are wondering if the War on Terror was used as a gateway to fight at war that may have been more about the financial security of companies such as Halliburton than the security of the American people themselves. More are looking beyond the price on the Exxon sign (which has nearly tripled in just three years) to think that perhaps more than just an increase in global demand and tighter supplies are to blame for the massive price increase that continues to make life more difficult for working people depending on their automobiles in our automobile-focused infrastructure. Financial corruption in corporate America, and the sympathetic people in congress who seemingly face more corruption-related indictments each week, are gaining the attention of the average voter and making them think. Even members of my traditionally very-conservative family are second-guessing what they have always believed about the status quo and the benevolence of those currently in power (mainly on the Republican side).

This trend is a troublesome one for the current party in power and for the status quo that allows the rich to get richer by nearly any means (including outright corruption and loss of American jobs and innocent lives) on the backs of everyone else. The workers of America are still a sleeping tiger (loose pun loosely intended) but they are begining to flinch just a bit. The Democrats unfortunely still don't have any really good answers and have spent so much time going to the far-left on social issues when they really should have focused on moving back to the left financially. As it is...with little to go on in the Democratic side and an unquestioned lack of sympathy on the Republican side...America's working and middle classes are still without a vehicle with which they can bring about substantial change. That is why I am unsure that many Americans will vote to make a change in Washington in 2006...many may just stay home out of frustration except in places such as Texas where two independents are legitimate gubenatorial candidates.

However...history has shown that genuine oppression in the United States is only tolerated for so long. Working Americans will soon rise up and shout with their voices and their votes to end this corrupt system and restore our democracy to the fair and free system many of us once thought we had. It will probably be played off at first as merely discontent people thinking only of themselves...but as it persists...the socio-ecnomic nature of the political uprising will be very clear. It will only take a few hundred thousand more layoffs...a few dozen more corruption allegations against members of congress...a few hundred more indictments of executives for financial evils. At least this is my hope. My optimism has been challenged in recent months...but history has shown that optimism does not always lead to disapointment. I look forward to the day when the majority of Americans currently taken-advantage of finally stop doing what they're told and stand up for themselves.

The Prodigal Returns to South Austin

Hello this is me updating for the first time since...apparently the immigration protests. For those of you who got burned out on that story. The protested engendered an initially positive response from congressional authorities and the public alike. Pressure was put on Washington to create a comprehensive reform bill. Even the President gave a nationally televised prime time address in support of such a bill. Then...a little partisanship got in the way...the pro-immigrant groups again protested en-mass...a national "day without an immigrant" boycott was held. This time though people reacted less positivley...the protests seemed overbearing. Congress turned a deaf ear. A music group make a massive P.R. blunder by releasing a version of the U.S. National Anthem en Espanol and any attempts at reforming a broken border system fell apart in the House. Depressing? A little bit...to me at least. Damn politics. But that is not what I am writing about actually...

It's been two months since I graduated from Texas State University with a Mass Communications degree. I'm taking some time off from looking for a career job for now to focus on getting my stuff together. Mainly not be broke, mabye get a laptop and take advantage of all of this free time to further build the relashonships that I have been blessed with in the Austin-San Marcos area.

I have moved in to a house in near South Austin...just a mile from Downtown not far from South First Street and Barton Springs. I really really like this neighborhood and would like to stay here longer if I can. I will probably write about it more in the future...for now I'll just say that it's practically my dream neighborhood. Lots of local establishments...lively but not obnoxious...very diverse in many different respects and several corner coffee shops and weird stores and such. The location is insurmountably great and the other two guys living in the house are quite agreable so far and I doubt that I will have any issues with the house (besides the fact that the a/c just quit but even so it's still worth it, and it'll probably be fixed soon).

So for now I'm borrowing a roommate's computer and hopefully I will have one of my own soon and can dedicate some of this free time to writing more.

Why Immigrants Should be Seen As People

Watching the massive debate of the status of some 12 million illegal and undocumented immigrats (who are actually two different things) I have become somewhat upset over how the debate has progressed. It's not that I'm mad that all of these people are trying to get out of their lousy countries and make a halfway decent living for themselves and their families on this side of our precious God-given (sarcasm) border that...um, if I remember correctly we kind of forcefully drew in the 1800's...nor am I upset about potentially losing (this is assuming that we could actually force 12 million people back across) the God-given (see first reference) economic benifits that they provide to the child of manifest destiny. Nope...I'm simply concerned about the fact that the humanity of these millions of people...many of which have taken to the streets lately to protest their systematic exploitation...has been replaced and they are now look at by many of us with green dollar figure obsessed lenses. At every point in the imigration debate...the central question is not the status of their families, their livelyhood...their economic well being...it's ours. The debate has changed to being a question of human rights and morality clashing with the rule of law...it's become "which answer to the immigrant question provides the most benifit to the American Economy".

As this point in conversations about the issue I get that feeling one gets when they hold for expected appluase and all they here as murmuring and a cough or two. You see...the economy is everything to us. I agree that it is important...but I also agree that human rights and the well being of the people in question is also importiant. Some people think nothing about our Government spending hundreds of billions of dollars to blow up and rebuild another country on the other side of the World...but God forbid we allow doctors to give emergency care to the sick child of some illegal immigrant who's freeloading off the society that our tax dollars support (of course I don't believe this, I'm not that ignorant...by the way their sales tax rate is the same as ours). Is the economy more importiant than people. I'm going to be Anti-American here and say no. Damn the Economy if it's going to continue to be built on a foundation of exploitation. I'm all about having a good economy...but only if it's built on respect for human rights of everyone living here and around the World.
But why should these immigrants be seen as people? Well, for one thing they all have beating hearts...human brains, for the most part two eyes, ears, arms...and they all have a soul. They all have basic fundemental human rights. The right to exist. If the immigration debate would be framed with this in mind, instead of simply being about the economy...then mabye many of us would be convicted to think a little more compassionately about our neighbors instead of hypocritically denying them the rights that we think we were destined to recieve...when really 98% of us were born in this country because one of our ancestors came to this country the same way that they did.
I'm not writing this to enter the debate between the fence building and the "let them all in" crowds...I just want to remind anyone who reads this that we're talking about people, not dollar signs.

The Wonderful World of SXSW

Spring Break for me was very Central Texas focused. I spent a couple of slighly moody days in my hometown of Temple...but most of it was in downtown Austin. I have this internship with News 8 Austin. It's going well...I like it there and want to work there. This kept me in town for South by Southwest, which, despite it's flaws and stuff...is a great thing even if you're a freeloader like myself.

*more later*

Broadcast Newz

The news is getting pretty funny...not to say that it wasn't funny before, but seriously funny. Sure, having a well known (in Austin) Austin lawyer shot by the vice president is pretty funny...except for the part about the physical pain and being in ICU and things of that nature...or handing over control of six of our ports to a company that is basically controlled by the United Arab Emirates, or the government spying on Americans without a warrant, or anyway...perhaps it's not the news that's so funny, it's the way it's being portrayed. Allthough I'll admit seeing Tom Delay's name in the Travis County felony court docket the other day was very amusing.

Remember the Recent Disney film version of "The Alamo?"

Me neither...allthough actually I do only because it was filmed in Hays County, where I live. For some reason actor Jason Patrice...or however you spell it, it really dosen't matter, he's not really that marquee of an actor anyway, thinks he's a big shot and shouldn't have been arrested like a normal person. His most well known film is the recent Disney version of the Alamo, which lost out worse at the box office than the Texas Army did at the Alamo. He sued the Austin Police Deptartment alleging unfair treatment when he got arrested for something that wasn't very relevant to anything in your daily life. A.P.D. won and the city and nation collectivley yawned. Mabye he should just sue all of the people who didn't go see the Alamo because that would have probably made him a larger celebrity and given him a greater chance (provided he could get the case moved to a court in Los Angeles). A better idea was to make a film that didn't bomb. Anything would have worked better. Mabye instead of Billy Bob Thorton in the lead role, they should have exhumed the bones of John Wanye (as sacreligious as that would be to rural america and all of the guys with the "God Bless John Wanye stickers" on their trucks...on that note...why?...He's dead...unless it's a metaphorical "God bless John Wanye" as in "That John Wanye guy was awesome and I'm going to put a sticker on my truck to memorialize him because I'm living out my wild west dreams vicariously though his movies)...brought the bones on the set and animated them...then put a C.G.I. version of the Duke into the film playing seven of the eight most promenent cast members of the Texas army (Juan Antonio Seguin being the exception...nah, a C.G.I. John Wanye could pull that one off too). The point is that even John Wanye's dead corpse would have meant better box office numbers. Therefore Jason Patrice should just shut up and go back to being the nobody that he doesn't realize he is.

Speeding for Jesus

(I've decided I'm not going to write about my own life so much or what I'm feeling but more on observations, at least on this page)

Driving downtown (Austin) today on the Freeway (I-35...which I call "the Freeway"...mabye because everyone else calls it 35 and it's my statement of distain for the modern world...or I just like the word freeway...yea...that's it...it's a nice word...nice and free, in a way). On the way there (and back) from my comfortable place in San Marcos I noticed four distinct times where people were speeding in a reckless way. Now...everyone under the age of 70 speeds at some point on 35 (which ironically, has a speed limit of 70)...the flow of traffic usually hovering between 80 and 85. However, there is a differece between speeding and speeding with a reckless disreguard for human life (driving much faster than the flow of traffic and changing lanes unnessicarily in an agressive way). One of those drivers was a guy in a rather large black truck...I passed him, then minutes later he suddently decided he wanted to go over 100 miles per hour for some reason, so he sped by me dangeriously, weaved though traffic that was already going over 80, and disapeared into a thoughtless (not a random use of that word) oblivion. Naturally, I must give him the benifit of the doubt (parenthetical reference), perhaps his friend called to tell him that H-E-B was putting Bud Light on sale and he was rushing there so he could drink then and then litter his neighborhood with the empty cans the next day...or his water broke...which would have been distubing but probably would have made him famous.

You've already forgotten about the other three cars that I mentioned. There were three other cars, this is your reminder. Anyway what stood out about each of those cars was the shiny metallic fish symbol promenently placed on the back of each car. Three of the four cars driving in the most reckless and agressive way were advertising Christianity. Now don't get me wrong, I know that nothing says "Jesus loves you" more than tailgating someone until you find an open space slightly larger than your car to squeeze though and pass that person in such a way that they're sure to notice your religious affiliation and move them one step closer to Atheism. Not that this is the biggest problem in the perception of Christianity by the general public...but it is a microcosm of the problem. It is also the main reason why I refused from the start to attach a fish to my car.

My driving doesn't exactly reflect Christlike principles and in addition to that fact, I'm the person with a soul, not my car. The comment is sometimes made that aliens observing our planet mistaking automobiles as the dominant species. But not only that, they would probably notice that the cars in North America have a dominant fish worshipping religion and that those cars are always in a hurry because by being in a hurry they bring glory to the shiny metal fish in the great ocean.

My point is that in so many ways people wear religion on their sleeves (or their bumpers) while the rest of the shirt is in tatters and the glaring divide between what we say we are and what we truly are is only going to harm us in the long run. So take the fish off your car and examine the truth and the reasons behind your beliefs instead of throwing them on like the shirt on your floor that doesn't smell as bad as the other ones...don't worry, you won't go to hell for doing so, allthough some aliens might think that your car will.

San Marcos Stories

My first entry of the New Year...I didn't plan on it happening so late. My break was awesome, writing about it would only serve as partial justice so I will refrain from doing so in order to process my thoughts concerning a few more recent events. This is mostly intended for my friends who hopefully still check this from time to time.

I have made a few observations of things that I am thankful for.

First, I really like San Marcos...it continues to grow on me in an amazing way. We live in paradise compared to many places...the people are great, the nearby cities (particularly Austin) are awesome, it's located in the scenic Texas Hill Country...and the weather has been fantastic. It's been close to perfect (sunny, often under 20% humidity, highs in the 60's, 70's and 80's) almost every day so far this month, which happens to be January...perfect weather is not common in January in many places north of the Equator...but in Central Texas it is.

Secondly, there is a great community forming here among my friends and I have had little to do with making it happen...neither have they...it's just, happening. I have the best friends here and in other parts of Texas and the United States that I could have ever imagine and I am so extremely thankful for them.

Third, last semester was rough...very challenging at times...however, I can look back on the experiences I had and be comforted that I did actually grow while I underwent them. Now, I am less picky and materialistic than before...I thought I was already, but I learned otherwise...I still had a lot to grow in those areas and I still do as of today.

Fourth, I love working with junior high/high school kids...I'm thankful for that because that is what I currently do for a living. I was skeptical about it at first...but my skepticism was won over by a sense that I am doing something, for now at least, that I am somewhat gifted at...simply investing in the lives of those that are a little younger than myself. The same is true of a few freshman guys that I have gotten to know over the past semester. It's strange...I have always mainly associated with people that are my age, maybe a year or two younger, or a year older...and yet now I have found myself building relationships with guys that are younger than that...but I really do love those guys and I know that I help them out and yet they've blessed my life as well in a big way. I contenue to learn that you cannot put limits on friendship or on love of any kid. I have seem people that I wrote off based on age, background, where they are from or their interests become some of my best friends here at Texas State. I used to hate being proven wrong but in this area I really do not mind so much.

For those of you reading that know me, those of you that I consider to be my friends...I love you, I really love all of you guys...I just need to find a good way to express it. Thank you so much.

- Jordan

Central Texas Sunsets Are Amazing

I grew up in Central Texas but I never really appreciated the sunsets here until recently. I love sunsets...nothing says "God exists" like an incredibly colorful soon to be evening sky lit up with more colors than I could percieve to exist. Celestial artwork so unapprochable and incredible that nothing created by man can match its beauty. The last few sunsets have been especially amazing. Yesterday I was driving though the plain landscape of Temple along a long and straght boulevard and had to pull over at a disc golf park to fully admire what was to be one of the greatest sunsets that I have ever seen, anywhere. I stood, sat, and snapped pictures for a good half hour, the entire time trying to convince myself that what I was seeing was real. It was amazing. In a few days I'll post a picture or two.

The landscape in Temple and most of Bell County may be plain and boring, but the sky here does all that it can to make up for it at sunset. The average beauty of the sunsets here far outshines anywhere else that I have ever lived or spent more than a couple of days at. I'm looking forward to returning to San Marcos this weekend...I like the landscape there much more than here...but I will miss the sunsets. It's hard to explain it I guess to someone who hasn't spent a lot of time here but for at least 20 or 30 minutes on a given day it is one of the most beautiful places on Earth.

A Few Things That I Hat...er...Sort of Dislike About Temple

I'm not a naturalist by any strech but I am starting to think that there are certian limiting effects that certian environments, such as my hometown of Temple, can have on the people who know nothing but that environment.

Of course, I do "like" my hometown ("hometown in this case is a general reference to the Temple/Killeen/Bell County Area in which I spent almost all of my childhood)...however, there are certian things about the atmosphere here that, in light of my own experiences in other places...tend to frustrate me. Spending the winter break here has reminded me of the reasons that I should appreciate the fact that I now live elsewhere. This is not to say that I do not have strong connections here and additionally not to say that there are not things here that I miss, but I have been doing a lot of thinking about those things that I know dislike that I never really even noticed before I left.

I am first amazed that moreso than in any other place that I have visited, you really do need access to a car to survive. I am only recognizing this because my car's engine threw a rod and I currently do not have a working vehicle as a result. It's a spread out place, a very spread out place. No place it's size or larger that I have ever visited is more spread out with a more dispersed population and infrustructure. Temple has around 60,000 people but it's limits strech as far as 7 miles south of the city "center"...6 miles north, and an astounding (in relation to population) 13 miles to the west (everyone wants to live near the lake I guess). My friend Dan's family lives 11 miles from downtown but still in the city limits. Housing developments are placed almost indescriminantly in a widely-spaced patchwork fashion across a wide, flat, and mostly boring landscape. Driving around town you can see new KB Home or Centex housing developments surrounded on all sides by fields with short brown grass, brush, some cows and the occasional lonely tree. This isin't so bad I guess, if your car works. Otherwise you had better have friends, which I fortunetly do.

The atmosphere here is static. People are generally nice I guess. Heartland American values thrive in one of the reddest parts of "red America". However, there is also a stifiling sense of a lack of change, or a willingness to change. People welcome a new resturant by flooding into it and placing it on the front page of the local paper. Development and new residents are welcomed as well. But other changes, idealogoical ones, will likely not take place here in my lifetime. It seems like a lot (but not all) of people here do not really determine their own values, but are content to let others do so. The area is staunchly conservative...I don't think that in itself is a problem...the problem is in the sort of "yellow-dog" conservativism that exists here. I once thought of myself as a conservative because I was raised here and that is from birth pretty much what you are taught is absolutely right and anyone that is branded a liberal is excommunicated from any credibility or any chance to be right about anything. That sort of, what I will come out and say is closed-mindedness, creates a very shallow dynamic for discussing anything of any sort of importiance. I'm not a "left-wing nut" or a "liberal-extremist" but if I were to share the polictical views that I have fairly independently arrived upon (at least they are far more independent than many held here) I would quickly be branded as one and most people would not give any sort of creedence to anything I said beyond that.

This is not to say that everyone here is this way...or that all conservatives are this way (there are certianly a lot of open minded conservatives...they just happen to be more often found in other parts of the country)...but a good number are and the general atmosphere leans in the direction of shallowness and superficial beliefs that are not deeply held. Many people here are deeply religious, but the rest are shallowly so because you don't really want to stand out that much. The social norm is that you go to church, or at least appear as if you do so. Some grow up here and leave with a strong idealogical and worldview footing, but many others flounder when they leave (or if they stay). It's hard to defend your beliefs when you don't know why you believe what you do. Many young people here, even some friends of mine, struggle because they were never thought to think independently or to question things in order to have some understanding of what they say, do, think and claim to believe. I know that this happens to some degree everywhere, but it is an especially prevelent problem here.

Hold Up Watts

I've been thinking a lot about the Inner City lately. Particularly Watts and Compton, two areas in Los Angeles County that are very notorious for gangs and crime. I think about them because I have spent time in both. When I was in Watts I knew that it was one of the worst areas in the country for violent crime. I worked with a group that was putting on a one day sports camp for kids in the Nickerson Gardens housing project. I would later read that this project is the birthplace of the nortorious Bloods gang. The Crips were also born in Watts, which is an area in Southeast Los Angeles. It's described as "drive over country", because you drive over it on a freeway. Even my "street-smart" team members and I would avoid the area when returning to our house near downtown from working in Compton or Lynwood. It's a rough place to say the least. I talked to one resident of the Nickerson's describe how he had been shot at just a few nights before, and how he watched an LAPD squad car get fired upon as it drove though the neighborhood. The LAPD does not go to Watts, unless they absolutely have to. It is the closest thing to anarchy that I have personally witnessed. When the cops do venture there to answer a call, bad things happen. Just the other night a squad car was driving in Watts at 5 a.m...suddently a laser guided sight flashed though the car's interior and a bullet ripped though the hood of the car. The cop was unharmed but he was very lucky to be. Earlier this summer, not long after we vistied the Nickerson's, two L.A. cops sparked massive protests when they fired on a suspect and killed him, and his three year old daugher. In an environment that is no less tense than the one that led to the riots in 1992, one incident like that is enough for the entire city to be concerned.

This gang war-torn part of Southern California was in the news a lot this past week due to the excecution to alleged Crips co-founder Tookie Williams. He was convicted of very horrible crimes, crimes that even I think warrant the death penalty as a reprocussion (I only support the death penalty in the most extremely extreme cases)...however he maintains his innocence. Many people think that he is either innocent, or that at least he has found redemption. He has, from his cell at San Quentin, written several books designed to dissuade kids from joining gangs, he has been a vocal advocate against the gang violence he was once such an active player in. This man, even if he commited the crimes that he was convicted of, has done more for inner city kids in the past 20 years than the vast majority of people anywhere. Ironic isin't it. And honestly, in a case of minority inner city resident versus the justice system, I don't know who to believe because this past summer I heard a lot of things from the inner city minority point of view for the first time and that point of view radically altered my perception of a lot of things. Did Tookie deserve to die? I honestly don't know. I do know that the hundreds that die of gang violence every year shouldn't die. This shouldn't be happening. There is something at work there that is henious, and goes far beyond the simple explinations given in social and political circles when the topic of the inner city is on the table.

These kids in Watts, in Compton, anywhere in Inner City L.A...are kids...they are simply kids...that is all. Children. I watched them play that day in the Nickersons. They jumped around, played soccer, football, basketball (the teens and young adults could seriousl ball, unfortuntely they are only so many that can be good enough to escape the ghetto, and it is a ghetto, they're trapped), they joked around. One kid named James and his friend told me about their plan to take a road trip to Las Vegas when they were older. They said it with such hope, such expectation. However, that is about all the hope you'll find there. Most of them can't see past Watts, can't see past the bleak reality of daily gun fights, a constant stream of deaths of people that they know, constant fear...fear of the other gang, the other race, the police...all they know is the maze of drab apartment buildings beneath a steady stream of jumbo jets approching LAX full of people who have little knowledge of the brazen reality that swarms ten-thousand feet below them.

My friend Michael was shooting a basketball with a kid, about eight years of age, he asked him a normal question..."do you like it here?"

"No", he answered, "there are too many shootings here".

He is right, if an eight year old knows this, then there is something very wrong with a society that allows this to fester without lending a hand, anything, to this black hole that seems to absorb light, hope and innocence. It is not a hopeless situation, unless the status quo of sectarian society caring only about it's own class and social groups contenues to function as the norm. Until then...the people in Watts, both black and brown, will have to fend from themselves.

"You're good people," a visably nervious twenty-something mexican guy with knife scars on his face told me and three of the girls that I was working the sports camp with. "You shouldn't be here. Good people don't come to Watts."

"Somebody has to come here", we told him. We were there precisely because Watts needs good people...but more importiantly we reminded him that there were good people in Watts...not everyone is there to join gangs, deal drugs and shoot people. Some are just trying to survive. He cracked what vaguely resembed a smile. He was encouraged to an extent but said he could never be a good person in Watts. I understood where he was coming from. "Good" and "bad in the inner city are very different concepts than the good and bad that most of us are familar with. "Well you guys better be careful", he said, "they'll mess with you." He was probably right, but as nervious as that made me I kept up a good front. I had to. Fear like that is something that I just didn't know coming from a comfortable place like Central Texas.

We walked back to the park. I walked into the Nickerson Gym...a humble brick building at the corner of 114th and Compton. Without looking outside, if it wasn't for what I had heard (and seen) that day, it would have been easy to imagine being anywhere in the United States. It was a gym with a basketball court and kitchen. However, scanning the walls my eyes glanced over various photographs...one of which was a snapshot of the moment a truce was reached between the Crips and Bloods, the most notorious gang rivalry in America. That truce imploded this year. Watts is again at war. But for that moment there was hope. I went back outside...Michael and I decided to start a pick up soccer game with some of the kids. For the next hour or so, they could forget about shootings and gangs and poverty and the fathers that they never see, and concentrate on scoring goals. For that hour I also forgot about the fear manifest in my surroundings and found myself completely at peace in the middle of the Nickerson Garden's project in Watts. It was at that moment that I gained just a fraction of understanding of what this moment meant to the kids. The smile on my face, and the smiles on theirs as we played on that dusty field in an area that even cops are afraid to enter, was something that I did not expect. Those smiles, the innocence, the oasis of innocence in a place where innocence often dies a early death, struck me as something truly beautiful. A beauty so stark that it still makes me crack a tearful smile months later. It makes me wonder if evil exists simply to make good things that much more attractive and wonderful.

Dude, Where's My Journal?

The semester is over, and I, seeking a path down which to channel my seemingly unlimited free time, have gathered barely just enough motivation to make a post for the first time in, really, many weeks. I took my last final exam only 6 hours ago and now I still can't seem to grasp the fact that my semester is over and I will have to radically and quickly figure out something to do with the time that was only too recently occupied by studying.

I don't have any money. Can't do much about that as I have had about the worst financial luck that I could imagine this semester. I have decided not to write about the semester because really, it was tough at times and downright frustrating at others. There were many happy events that occured though. I will likely do some reflecting upon those.

I already find myself missing people that only left town today. I will be spending a good portion of the break in Temple with some of my best friends and family, trying to make the most out of my suddently more limited resources.

Can't Escape The Line of Best Fit

As far as the contenuing legendary saga of the road trip goes...it will be concluded soon. But I want to write about other less legendary things as well.

---

So I'm here at Texas State...my life, despite all of the random challanges and circumstances, has been much happier lately. I'm seeing people...I've got a new job here in San Marcos and mabye another one that I'll also enjoy as well. However, a lot of things have been "getting to me"...one of them is being pretty much broke for now. My computer is also broke, after it fell out of my bag and onto the driveway in a dramatic fashion.

I just need to learn to be more content with my situation reguardless of what it is.

One thing that I do have is relashonships with some really awesome people. Last night I spent time with several of them at Sewell Park...but I am also bogged down with countless projects and tests for school, as well as some long term things that I am not getting done but need to.

Road Trip Part 2: The Epic Contenues to Progress in a Contenuious Fashion (Rated PG-13 for Strong conspicuiously masked language and partial-nudity)

We raced toward the ever widening chasm on Edward Gary Drive. Sorority girls looked on in horror at the upcoming gust of wind that would frazzle their already unraveling hair. Just before we were to tumble into the canyon I pushed the secret red button under the dashboard and the jet turbo boosters in my car kicked into gear, allowing my car to gracefully leap the chasm. We landed to the sound of squealing tires and numerous expletives. The car spun around several times and we came to a halt. Danny was laughing maniacally while threatening my life. I grabbed his wrist as he was lowering his arm to drive a bowie knife, one that has been in his family since long before the time of James Bowie, into my shoulder. IT WASN'T MY G-----N FAULT MAN...I DIDN'T KNOW THAT CANYON WAS GOING TO BE IN THE MIDDLE OF EDWARD F------ GARY DRIVE!!! Paul the hurdler looked stunned...I took the knife from Danny who was now crying as I explained that he was forgiven, and then tried to justify my outburst of profanity to Paul. Cody in the meantime sat expressionless in his seat, counting the days since the last time he had ridden in a car as it used a jet engine turbo blast to jump a newly opened urban canyon.

We drove on in stunned silence. Cody at times attempted to interject with akwardly timed statements over the rising price of milk and how it inversely affects the sorghum market. Danny mixed a couple of chemicals that he had secretly brought along, Paul pulled his finger out of his nose, wiped off the residual brain tissue, and began to laugh at the clear blue sky above. We pulled up to the odd looking traffic light at University and L.B.J. I put in a Slowreader cd to try to soften the tense mood in the car.

"I don't know if this quiet music is appropriate in this post 9/11 world, a world of rising gas prices, religious fanaticism and high anti-depressant use", Cody said. I assured Cody that I wouldn't play music if I thought that it would be un-patriotic. Danny stroked his crossbow, Paul drew a monkey on his shirt with a marker he found in the pile of trash on the floor of the car, and then ate the marker. Five minutes later, we still sat at the intersection.

"Why isin't the light changing"?...I wondered aloud.

"I think I know", Danny said.

The wait contenued.

Road Trip!

It has become a triditon on Monday around the hour of 5 p.m. to undertake a road trip in Diego "my car" from Central Campus to Harris Dining Hall, over a mile away. The food is a bonus but the real perk are the crazed hijinks that follow. Accompaning my on both
trips so far have been two of my favorite people: The venerable Cody Cheeves and none other than Danny "future President of the United States of America" Rodriguez. Each trip has had a cameo guest star, Matt Luna, who gained worldwide notoriety in the great Santa Cruz heroin bust of 2004, and this week Danny's hallmate and accomplished marathon hurdler known only as Paul the Hurdler of Venice.

The following reports of last Monday's trip are sketchy, and may or may not be merely a really awesome legend.

---

With the venerable one in the front seat, we drove by the musty and humble confines of Beretta Hall only to find Danny and Paul waiting disguised as gargoyles flanking the front steps. I approached them cautiously, emmitting sanskrit phrases that only Danny can comprehend and they came to life, resumed their normal forms, and got into the car. There were no clouds in the sky and yet we all felt a sense of cloudy prospects of unforseen danger lurking ahead on our trip. I peeled out cautiously, watching for terrorist and we began to circumnavigate the campus...with Cody using the word circumnavigate to describe everything that he had done that day. My first sign that things were not in their normal state was the gigantic chasm that opened in front of me as we flew down the hill on Edward Gary drive at 75 miles per hour. Cody screamed, Danny yelled, Paul ignorantly picked his nose and then screamed, the force of which jammed his finger up his nose and partially into his brain. I knew I had one option...but would my poorly installed jet boosters work?

To be contenued...

I Love School Most of the Time

You learn interesting things in this place known as the Texas State University School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

The following are random facts that I picked up from classes that I had no clue were...well, facts.

- The song "Happy Birthday" is actually copyrighted, and you have to pay the copyright owner to use it in a film.

- Television Networks are requried to provide at least three hours of educational childrens programming per week. ABC Television once tried to defend against the accusation by stating that The Flintstones and the Jetsons met the government's requirements...because the Flintstones told kids about the past, and the Jetson's told kids about the future. They lost their case.

- The only thing in the United States that cannot be patented is a fully developed human being. Certian microrganisims have actually been patented. Past copyright law stated that living things could not be patented but that was overturned in a court case.

- The "nusiance car ordinance" in the city of San Marcos states that if a vehicle is found with expiried registration (even if it is parked on a private lot or driveway), the city has the right to tow the vehicle.

- A Federal Court decision actually stated that it is legal under the First Amendment for a media outlet to falsify news, denying whistleblower status to fired reporters who were suing a Local Fox News station in Tampa that was doing just that in order to please certian advertisers.

- Americans view, on average, 3,600 advertisements per day.

- It is a common advertising strategy to market their products directly to children, knowing that they will then effectivley nag their parents to purchase those products for them.

I'll likely add more when I think of them.

I Think I've Contracted Avian Bird Flu

That or I need to use the bathroom.

Apparently our nation cannot survive without an apocalypse looming on the horizon. I would like to think that people would be content to think that the world is not about to end, but observation proves otherwise. The latest apocalypse revolves around a strain of avian bird flu mutating and being spread somehow by humans creating something called a "pandemic".

I'm not exactly sure what a pandemic is...but it sounds delicious. It sounds like a clinic where you learn to make bread...not just any bread, but medical bread with great medicinal properties.

Perhaps this bread will be the next cure for the next apocalypse. Y2K had generators and non-perishable food. For every dirty bomb threat there is a roll of duct tape. Gas is supposed to hit $8 a gallon or something in the next month leading to the collapse of the American lifestyle. Now, in the face of this grave and almost certianly apocalyptic pandemic...we have medical bread that is laced with stuff that is probably a cure, or at least something that will help us pass the time while we're dying. Corporations could market this bread, with an ad campagin declaring that if people do not purchase the special bread they will be killed by falling planes and civil unrest after the power goes out.

Banished to Suburbia (or, Exiled to Spend My Days Almost Exclusivley in Beautiful Sunny San Marcos)

The past week has been a somewhat turbulent one for myself, but beneficial at least in the short term. The turbulence began to turbulate (is that a word? Spell check says no but my heart says yes) last Tuesday when I was, with no advance warning or even the slightest hint, I was suddenly and not so gracefully let go from my job. I know am doing something that millions of other “bloggers” do, which is don’t work. There is not much to explain about it because my employer did not have much to explain to me about it. I told my manager how much this screws me over and makes life exceedingly difficult for me financially but I also said thanks for not hardcore firing me but instead just “letting me go”…and how that still sucks.

I’ll admit that, while they had no specific reason to let me go (very vague were their reasons), I was getting a little burned out. There have been subtle benefits for me losing my high-strung, busy and distant job which I had to commute to though often heavy traffic on the far side of Austin. None of them are, of course, financial, but do have a lot to do with my social life and my mental health. The major ones are as follows:

- A return to a normal heart rate
- A substantial reduction in swearing
- Less overall enmity toward mankind
- Fewer instances of saying things like “I want to burn this town to the ground”…and halfway meaning it
- Seeing and talking to people that I don’t work with, including my roommates
- No more “crazy eye”
- Going to bed before three a.m. on school nights means less gorilla like behavior the next morning.
- Seeing people I don’t recognize but know my name and ask me about things that I don’t remember doing
- No more scent of coffee flowing from my hair in the shower
- A regained ability to control the tone of my voice
- A 68% drop in “road rage”
- Fewer trips on the asphalt cauldron of death and super-fastness known as Interstate 35
- Going to Austin will now always be fun
- I no longer work for a guy that writes propaganda…er…speeches for President Bush
- My ears will no longer be damaged by senseless and irrational yelling by certain co-workers after closing
- I don’t have to bother taking off work after I get the pleasure of having my ingrown toenail removed tomorrow, because I’m already off the schedule.
- I get to see people that I like more often and for longer periods of time
- Stronger motivation to look for jobs in San Marcos, where I reside and learn, and hopefully soon, work.

Those are just a few of the subtle benefits…a few are slightly exaggerated but the overall theme is accurate.

Panda Watch

I've been assigned my first package story for my TV News class that will be due this Monday. I'm thinking about doing a piece on the preposed park above Aquarena Springs (where they were going to build the hotel/conference center before people found out and got pissed)...there will be a bond election on November 8 for the City of San Marcos to provide money to the park fund along with the county funds that have already been preposed. I think this story will work but I need a backup plan if it doesn't. If you guys can think of anything that you think will be a good idea just let me know. Thanks.

Don't Hate the ipod, Hate Yourself

The above title doesn't necessarily reflect the message of this entry, I just happen to like it.

I recently had the privilage of viewing the documentary entitled "The Corporation" (I'll give you three guesses to figure out what it's about). The film made a number of interesting points and presented a variety of interesting facts and opinions (And do so in such a way that you could distinguish between the two). Among them, was the idea that corporations today are no longer require to rely on physical products to be successful (parenthetical reference), all the really need to do is produce a brand, and market it in such a way that people become attached to and have a sort of weird relashonship to that brand. Great examples include McDonalds for fast food, Nike for shoes, Starbucks for "coffee", and of course, the ipod.

What is it about the ipod (and apple products in general in the Austin area) right now that has broght on such incredible dominance and popularity in the mp3 market? Is it the best player? Not necessarily? The cheapest? Hardly...what I see is just another manifestation of an old pattern...society in general has become obsessed with yet another name.

Of course, critics of people like myself who would dare attempt to vaguely question the masses' seemlingly fetishistic devotion to big name brand corporations (in this case, the ipod) will play the "you're just jealous because you can't afford one" card...mabye they're right, but then again, your economic class background and status does affect your viewpoint on a lot of things, including pop and (espeically) consumer/material culture. Since I am the caretaker of all my financial responsiblities I am unable to afford to risk the expense...but then perhaps that gives me a freedom to have a vantage point outside the realm of materialistic competition.

One thing this viewpoint, along with a pretty holistic media education, is the ability to percieve the difference between simply creating products and creating brands to be objects of devotion for millions. In the early days of the ipod, it was marketed as a device to listen to all your favorite music on a small pocket sized object. ipod commercials mainly showed sillouhetted figures dancing rhymically to a bland U2 song in front of a random monochromatic background...now, most ipod ads focus on a trendy looking head with white headphones plugged into their ears...the white headphones that became a status symbol, joining their older siblings: The swoosh and starbucks mermaid as things many people think they need to wear on or around them in order to be a part of the "in crowd"...whatever that means.

So the ipod, like a pair of Nikes in the 90's, or a starbucks container, is now marketed in a way that focuses on what the product looks like more than what the product does. Yet another hallmark of materialism that the masses can identify with because they increasingly find fewer and fewer sources of true identity in our increasingly homogeneic popular-culture.

Camp Mozart's

Where was I last weekend?

Well, the bills have to be paid, and my quest to pay them broght me to work on Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. Why was I given such a schedule...well, the ACL Festival was in town, and a good portion of the workforce at Mozart's coffee roasters (beside, of course, myself), had taken a leave of absence to attention.

And we were busy, quite busy, thanks to tens of thousands of evacuees from
Hurrican Rita crowding in from Houston. The two large groups of people spawned the spontaneous creation of Camp Mozart's...the main schedule consisited of the afore mentioned work shifts that my friend Jim and I shared, then crashing at Jim's place...and a good deal of hanging out during the day on both Saturday and Sunday.

I arrived on Friday, the village idiot circus had begin around Zilker park...thousands of out of town drivers, blending with the usual local traffic, maneuvering their cars in a fashion that suggested the apocalypse was indeed neigh. I decided to drive from the U.T. area over to Thundercloud to grab a sub sandwitch before work. Two miles, twenty minutes and three near accidents later I arrived following behind four rather good looking girls who apparently thought that local ordanances permittied good looking co-eds to walk side by side down the middle of public streets. I wave and smiled in an admittedly sarcastic fashion...they didn't seem to notice but fortuntely I had reached my destination.

I purchased a classic sub and had a good but short conversation with the workers there as we lamented the upcoming weekend and our general distain for large crowds of tourists. Working in the Central Austin area means you generally dread the weeks that most people in Central Texas look forward to. Did I mention it was hot? If the organizers of the Austin City Limits Music Festival were to schedule their even in the middle of January, I'll bet you a pair of overpriced Coldplay tickets that the temperature will still exceed 100 degrees. My car, fortunetly, does not have air conditioning...making driving in unusually bad (and it's usually bad) traffic even more exciting and confortable. Aparently the bonus features of purchasing an A.C.L. wristband included hours of exposure to 101-108 degree heat and the blazing Texas Sun, trading body sweat with a few thousand other people, and inhaling an unhealthy amount of dust that was kicked up by the 70,000 or so attendees on the very dry surface of Zilker Park. But hey, at least the Hurricane didn't affect us, allthough apparently the only way to get the temperature under 100 degrees here in September is a hurricane, which is not something you can just cross your fingers and count on happening.

Camp Mozart's did improve however. After a tiring and long night of work I crashed at Jim's place...and woke up the next day to find that some very awesome friends of mine from other area codes and states had driven into town. We kicked it around the drag for a while, I went with them to Chuy's but then Jim and I left for the second night of work at Camp Mozart's. It happened to be the busiest night I've ever worked. An extremely long line, two of them in fact, out the door all night. Evacs and their families for the first half of the tight, and then hundreds of festival-goers later on, most of whom resembed tomatoes and said that they were having a great time at A.C.L. despite all of the retinal damage and the overall look of "dear God what am I doing in this horrible blazing furnace of a place" look in their eyes.

Sunday was much more of a sublime day. Abel was my one friend in the group that came to town that didn't have a wristband, so I kept him company all day. We got a burrito, did a couple of random errands, then drove around in my car in the 108 (offically) degree heat before realzing what a terrible idea that was and going back to our friend's apartment where I got to watch the Cowboys pull out a startiling come from behind victory over the lousy 49ers. Work was all that was left at this point so I went and made it though one more evening and then returned to San Marcos, signaling the end to Camp Mozart's...not my favorite camp ever, but it was better than going to jail, or something like that.

Oh, did I mention I'm really glad that they don't hold the A.C.L. fest every weekend? Well, I'm really glad...otherwise I would move to Sweden, purchase a team of sled dogs, and drive off to the North Pole where hopefully I would be cryogenically frozen next to Ameila Earhart and Tupac only to be unfrozen in a future void of such mass-tourist corporate dollar driven events, or a future where at the very least I can afford to attend them.

Hot Hot Heat: Early Fall in Central Texas

It's really starting to feel like Fall in Central Texas.

High Temperatures from Austin Bergstrom Airport over the past week (which are usually right at, or close to those in San Marcos).

Fri - 101
Sat - 103
Sun - 108
Mon - 107
Tue - 104
Wed - ? (Forcast high is 104)

The weather lately has bascially punished me for the two months I spent in sunny but not nearly as hot L.A. I thought I had gotten out of the heat thing for this summer, but I was wrong. I normally wouldn't mind but spending two months away was quite a disaclimating experience. It's been harder to find simple motivation with the weatherbeing so freakin' hot and blazing. The good news is that a cold front will drop our high temperature tomorrow all the way to 84 so we're going to have much cooler weather for a couple of days.

For the Weather Channel I'm Jordan Stewart.

I usually would write about something more interesting, but this is a part of my life right now since I've had to spend a lot of time walking outdoors, or riding in my very non-air conditioned car (including on Sunday when it was 108).

San Marcos is Spanish for Fantasy-Land

Despite the awkwardly performed break in to my duplex (two of my roommates had laptops stolen) last week, I feel extremely safe in San Marcos. Our place is the only place in the neighborhood to be broken into in the past few years. Petty theft is probably the most of my worries here. This contrasts sharply to where I lived this past summer, Inner City Los Angeles…a city where violent crime and police chases are a daily occurrence. San Marcos is, by contrast, an extremely "safe" community. Texas State University, despite its size and dense urban setting, is an extremely safe college campus. After almost one month back in the area (this time living in San Marcos instead of commuting from Austin) I have arrived at the conclusion that where I am living is basically a fantasy world, a nice hilly little hamlet of safety and security (just outside of a much larger but still fantastically safe for it's size city called Austin) that most people around the world, not to mention Inner-City L.A., could not imagine.

This town has so much beauty, especially by Texas standards; San Marcos is so nice that just saying that it is "nice" understates just how nice things here are. Of course there are problems, traffic congestion, outdated traffic lights (all of which are slated for replacement in the next year), trains crossing major streets at rush hour, the typical problems associated with the college party scene (mainly noise and, God forbid, kids smoking pot), a very tight job market (mainly due to having thousands of students in such a small area) and the town's identity crisis, it's refusal to fully admit that it is a growing metropolitan college city.

But then the list of problems pretty much ends...and if you have spent a significant time anywhere else, especially a place as radically different as Los Angeles...you might notice that these problems aren't really worth complaining about. Someone living in L.A. is probably more concerned about their kid getting caught in the crossfire of a gang shootout, or a riot exploding in their neighborhood, than they are about someone not using their turn signal or how bad traffic is, or getting stuck at that damn red light all the time. Then there's the list of things in San Marcos (local and Austin Metro Area characteristics) that are just plan amazing after spending time in the Inner City. Among them:

- Extremely clean air
- Extremely low crime
- Virtually no violent crime-
- Virtually no gang activity
- Walking alone at night not extremely dangerous
- Natural beauty and open spaces in and around the city
- A picturesque and blight-free cityscape
- Visible stars at night (You see more helicopters than stars in L.A.)
- Extreme quiet at night, quiet during the day.
- Affordable rent/housing (not compared with the rest of the state of course, but very affordable compared to Southern California)

This is not meant to be a comparison between San Marcos and L.A...the two places are so radically different that a comparison would be illogical. There are many things about L.A. that I miss, I love the city, the ocean, the weather there is much more plesant in the summer, there are so many things to do and see there. The reality of life there is much less of a fantasy and more like "real life" than here. What I am getting at are the things about our beautiful town that I see are, for the most part, generally taken for granted. I'm saying that San Marcos is an incredible place to live and most people here don't seem to recognize that...maybe because they have never lived anywhere that is more challenging or real than here (kids from Inner City Houston and others are definite exceptions). This is meant to be a positive summary of my impression upon my return to Central Texas. I perceive life here very differently than I did before this summer.

San Marcos is a postcard town. San Marcos is a fantasy world compared to the harsh reality of life in many other areas. San Marcos should not be taken for granted. If you live here, the next time you find yourself complaining about the typical topics most people (including myself) tend to complain about here, maybe take a moment to think of all of the positive aspects of this area, the things that maybe you take for granted. I mean, at least you get to see open spaces, and stars, and don't have to worry about flying bullets.

Anatomy of a Political Shift

It's not that I've been indoctrinated by a "liberal" education...I've just begun to truly gain the resources to think for myself. I think of myself as one of the last people that will let the masses, others, society, anything beside my own values (while those are admittedly shaped in part by those things I just listed) shape my views on anything.

I always thought for myself...but those thoughts and the experiences that I could draw from to form my (I believe) well formed (based on what I knew) thoughts and opinions where severely limited by my conservative upbringing in Bell County Texas, which could best be described as "infa-red America". Everyone there, it seems, is conservative...everything I ever heard, from my family, friends, and most everyone I met was tainted with a severe bias...a bias I did not recognize because in the society I was in it was simply mainstream thought. Of course I was taught that Christianity (which I did not embrace finally and fully until age 19) and conservatism (i.e. voting Republican) were inseparable. God was a Republican, if you are a godly person you vote Republican, bottom line. Voting democratic in some circles there is tantamount to breaking all of the Ten Commandments.

Enter college...well, not community college, but real college at Texas State. It is fairly liberal by Texas standards and I was exposed to much more in the way of points of view that were radically different from my own. Being for the first time strongly exposed to different viewpoints will always have an affect on a person. For my first year at Texas State I pretty much stuck with the political philosophy that I came in with (strongly conservative) but I began to question things in my mind. To this day I haven't told anyone in my family that I have begun to depart from the political doctrine that I was raised with. My immediate family wouldn't shun me but I wonder what my grandparents and others in my extended family would think. Some of my friends that remain there are also disenchanted with neo-conservatism but they also keep that fact in seclusion around some other people.

Do I now vote Democratic...actually I'm not sure at this point. However, I no longer embrace the Republican Party. One of my first realizations (beside the fact that maybe Liberals weren’t wrong about everything just because they're liberals) is that we live in a society where societal pressures essentially bully people into taking strict political sides...you're either a republican or a democrat, hardcore liberal or hardcore conservative. For example, if you're strongly pro-life (as I still am) then you have to subscribe to all of the remaining doctrines of conservatism (such as reduced Government involvement in environmental policy, which I strongly oppose)...many of which I have rejected over the past couple of years. Power is maintained by the status quo by tricking people into thinking that they do not have other options than to join in the heavily sectarian and sharply two-sided political fray. I'm not going to go into the specifics of my newly forming (it is still very much in process) political philosophy...I will address that in another entry. What I am trying to detail here is the process that I have been going though for a couple of years now. It's hard to realize that you actually believe you have been wrong about things literally all of your life. That the philosophy that so dominated your upbringing is, in your eyes, heavily flawed and tainted.

So here I am...yes, my political views have taken a sharp left turn, but remember that I started out on the extreme far right...I don't know how far left this will take me. All I know at this point is that I have rejected neo-conservatism (with a few, mostly social, exceptions) in favor of still forming views that will better reflect my value system. You see, my personal value system (which was radically changed three years ago) and that of neo-conservative ideals have clashed for those two or three years...leading to ideological conflicts and increased frustration and anger when discussing politics with others. This irritation peaked during last November's elections...I was not happy with anything. I marked my vote solidly for George W. Bush the G.O.P. one last time but realized that my value system, my heart, even my head, where not making the called. I simply wanted to vote and those societal pressures from where I grew up were still calling the shots. I will close this thought by stating that, especially in light of the increasingly disastrous operation in Iraq, my increasing distain and distrust of the big business and corporations that this administration coddles, and the utterly horrific handling of the Gulf Coast devastation by the White House, I very much regret that vote. Sure I didn't think that John Kerry was a good alternative...but then again, was he the only alternative. Should I open my mind and free myself from this trap of taking sides? That is the process I am in at the moment.

There will be much more to come on this. I need to get these thoughts out.

Blissful Ignorance (Homeless Children in the U.S. and Other Problems that Don't Exist)

This past summer I witnessed the reality of certain problems in Inner City Los Angeles that many people in (often Conservative) political circles will downplay, or even deny the existence of.

Here is the most notable one:

- Homeless children:

Skid Row, just east of the Financial Center of Downtown Los Angeles, is home to thousands of homeless people, many who struggle with drug and alcohol addictions, who have been concentrated there by the stunningly heartless policies of the city. The several missions there struggle to provide the services that they will find nowhere else. The unfortunate reality of having to get clean to enter a mission keeps many from the long term rehabilitative help that they need. Addictions are so powerful and destructive. One could legitimately argue that it is the decisions of these individuals that have placed them there...of course this does not take into account the influences of circumstantial factors on the likelihood of certain decisions, although some of the homeless there have a college education and were successful until they chose the path of chemical addiction.

There are some on Skid Row however that cannot be blamed for their situation. These are the children of those individuals whose only fault was being born into a life of misery by their addicted and homeless parents. These kids wander the streets...they have no opportunities...none. Forget school, they don't have the means to get there...some do, but it's tough, very tough. They have to do it on their own. Many of their parents are too busy trying to find another fix on the street to take care of them. Walking with a team of two girls into a crowded park area, the only source of green and growing things in the hideously blighted area, we came upon three girls. They were children, that was all. They didn't ask for money, they didn't (as far as I could tell) have any addictions, they were just children. It was apparent from talking to them that they had the same near-term desires as others their age...but already suffered from the lack of education and resources. Unless they can somehow escape from their situation, find shelter, a loving home, an education, they will languish in this miserable area that most of the millions in Southern California spent their days not thinking about. These are the forgotten children of the United States...I am writing the name of this country here with a purpose. These are the faces of kids in the United States that a vast majority of the people of this country do not know exist...if asked about them, many will go so far as to say there is no such thing here as homeless kids. When I relate the truth to many people here in Central Texas they are completely surprised because they have literally no idea. Nothing is mentioned in political social or economic circles about the forgotten children of the United States. These children are not a consideration of the mantra of "No Child Left Behind" because they simply do not officially exist.

The little ray of home in these kids lives is found in the missions (which are geared toward adults), and, perhaps more brightly, in the S.A.Y. YES! (Save America's Youth) Center for Youth Development housed at the under funded and under resourced storefront Central City Church of the Nazarene...located at the corner of 6th and San Pedro, the heart of Skid Row. The staff there works tirelessly to provide some help, some educational services, to the kids there. Their stories are heroic and heartbreaking...and unbelievable if you are one of the many suburban acculturated Americans that have never heard the story of America's forgotten children. If you are ever in L.A., I encourage you to visit this street corner and have your eyes opened to a terrible disgrace, and the tiny ray of hope that shines in this very dark place.

Hanging on one of the walls in the center is a painting of a radio...with the words "Sing now while you can" brushed onto the canvas, a visualization almost certainly inspired by the Jimmy Eat World song "Your New Aesthetic". When I visited the center my eyes gazed on the painting and I at once understood the significance of what was there...whether intended or not, the words describe the mission, the goal that the center has for these forgotten children. No matter what happens in the future. No matter the uncertainties that cloud their futures...they want these kids to sing, to laugh, to enjoy, at least for a moment, the childhood that is mostly denied them. Because of their work, and the few others on Skid Row who have not forgotten the forsaken, these kids have hope and they can sing, at least for now.

It is my prayer that others will have their eyes opened to them, and their hearts broken by the realization that even in this country, there are so many people living without hope who need us to show them that they can find it.