Clarion Content

Sometimes even your hardened Clarion Content editor is a sucker for sentiment. We have been working with an amazing life coach for the last two months, she is our partner and we are the grateful beneficiaries of her advice. We all need a little pick me up. And one doesn't have to wait until things are in crisis mode.



To that end, our dear friend, and life coach, Bonnie Cohen, introduced yours truly to a little thing called, TUT... a note from the Universe. TUT, the brainchild of Mike Dooley, stands for "totally unique thoughts." They are little, customized notes of inspiration emailed to all who sign up for the service. Sort of the opposite of Post Secret, rather than letting go your own personal demons via anonymously sending a confession out to the Universe, the Universe will anonymously send you a bit of positivity to get you through the day.

Our inner cynic alarms started buzzing immediately, the Universe is going to send me personalized daily happiness messages?? C'mon. But you know what? You read a few of'em, and you feel a little better, and then you realize it only took a minute or two. Cynic in retreat. It was so low maintenance.

Hey, what's not to like?

This may be how Dooley has gone from thirty-eight initial subscribers to just north of 450,000 today.

Read a couple good TUTs reposted by fans of the site here and here.

Labels: health, Practical Advice

Remember how the teacher used to say that? It is all fun and games until, usually the standard was, "until somebody loses an eye." Nobody ever lost an eye in my elementary school, but the concept was fairly well understood, "Quit f-ing around you damn kids or sh*t is gonna get serious."

This guy should have listened to the teacher, because he did worse than just losing an eye. Edward Archbold of West Palm Beach, Florida, took another one of those elementary school cliche's, "Give it to, Eddie, he'll eat anything..." too far last week and unfortunately died after eating "dozens of roaches and worms" in a four minute bug-eating contest, according to the Miami Herald.

The contest was sponsored by the Ben Siegal Reptile Store in Deerfield Beach, Floria. Archbold won, but the Broward County Sheriff's Office says before he could leave with his prize, a female Ivory Ball python, he began throwing up and then collapsed. The Sheriff’s Office is awaiting an autopsy report to determine what killed him. The Miami Herald quotes the pet store owner, "it wasn’t the food. Discoid roaches," store owner Siegel said, "are eaten by people all over the world."

The roaches served up at the contest were domestically raised. "They’re clean – raised for exotic pet feed," Siegel said. "We sell expensive animals, and these bugs are perfectly safe." The “Midnight Madness” bug contest had nearly thirty other contestant none of whom were sickened.

Sounds unpleasant nevertheless. Perhaps it was the shock or an allergic reaction? We never watch Fear Factor or its imitators, but this event just symbolizes the trickledown of reality tv culture.

Labels: Pop Culture, Practical Advice

Meaning is not manufactured, it is experienced.

Dipika Kohli has lived these words.



She intuitively knew them when she quit her first job out of college and moved to the other side of the globe. It was not her first move across cultures during a moment of strife.¹ Her parents had moved her and the family from Michigan to Goldsboro, North Carolina when she was ten years-old. It was a sudden and wrenching change for young Dipika, who just months earlier had lost her best friend to the terrorist bombing of Air India Flight 182. In a bitter irony, the bombing took place over the same Irish soil on which she found herself unexpectedly living many years later.

The Elopement is a headlong adventure, with much transit and transition. Like Ms. Kohli's life, it races from under snowy street lights and a lonely Lake Johnson, into the green Irish hills, with its lakes in the middle distance, then off to a Japanese metropolis of glass buildings and snaking corridors. It is breathless and thrilling, at times it feels as though one were reading The Bourne Identity of the Housewife.

The tale is filled with the kind of passion, intrigue and feeling that can only come from experience. Ms. Kohli takes us down a very personal path into her heart and soul. She acknowledges as much when she recounts her own struggles to feel comfortable and grounded in Japanese culture. She doesn't want be soto, which means "outside" but rather, the opposite, uchi, which literally means "inside."²

Her writing style mirrors that of her blog, Kismuth, the practical infused with the mystical, perhaps reflecting the duality of the cultures in which she was raised. In an interview with the Clarion Content, Ms. Kohli said she felt the tension and the joy of real, powerful reactions. She faced it travelling solo through India, meeting her Dad's uncles and her Mom's aunts, heretofore unknown, learning that although she grew up in a nuclear family in North Carolina, she was part of a large extended family that had by no means forgotten or abandoned her.

She faced her own reactions everywhere from a quiet, and sometimes lonely, Irish cottage to flying a kite by herself at lunchtime over Lake Crabtree, desperate to get away from a mindset that didn't suit her.

She notes that she was no finished product, instead, she says, "I liked who I was becoming." Ms. Kohli takes us through that becoming and beyond in what is the first of a four part series. A memoir that she hopes will, "give people time, space and permission to do some soul searching of their own."

The next installment, available October 15th on Amazon, is called, The Dive. For good reason, it will dig into the deeply personal topic of losing a pregnancy in a discompassionate town, in a realm of acquaintances, far from friends and loved ones. But before you get lost in total despair, as Ms. Kohli once was, remember this is ultimately a story of triumph and success, travelling through dark times and on to a place that has a happy family, with a healthy child, and a passion for the creative and the community, here, in Durham.

On her own website, Ms. Kohli quotes Joseph Campbell on a dark Hobbesian day,

"Modern romance, like Greek tragedy, celebrates the mystery of dismemberment, which is life in time. The happy ending is justly scorned as a misrepresentation; for the world, as we know it, as we have seen it, yields but one ending: death, disintegration, dismemberment, and the crucifixion of our heart with the passing of the forms that we have loved."

You can read The Elopement like that, with a samsaric sensibility, or you could let your soul run light and free, knowing the sun will come up tomorrow. Either way, or anywhere in between, there is lots of knowledge, wisdom and life story in these pages.

We are reminded of the words of the English poet Robert Herrick as we eagerly await the next volume from Ms. Kohli.

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today,
Tomorrow will be dying.


The Elopement is available for purchase here.


Ms. Dipika Kohli will be speaking at TEDx Raleigh on Oct. 13, giving a talk called "There's Not That Much Time Left."


Notes
¹Technically, it wasn't her second move either, that came when she dropped out of art school after a semester to move to Japan.
²American kids might say down, she wants to be down. Cool, inside, one who gets it. Not lame, excluded, outside the joke and the meaning.

Labels: Art, Durham, fiction, Practical Advice, thought

Little slices of Twitter... Our Tweets of the week.

Real quotes from real tweeters. We love to peak behind the curtain and into the lives of folks we hardly know. Some of these Tweets are PG-13 or even R. All of them keep it real. Easily offended, click here.

All spelling is that of original authors.




People suck. Why can't everyone just be dogs---S


Bros over hoes. Not bros over your girlfriend.---JM


Wish I had long skinny legs instead of muscular---MS


If only my dad was proud---DC


I'm a girl... don't touch my hair, face, phone, or boyfriend.---BD


I freaking hate depending on my mom for a ride #noplans---JS


The problem is I care way too much about people who don't give a shit about me---KB


"Applying Vodka to your face tightens pores and reduces risk of acne breakouts" no dad I swear the smirnoff is my facewash---NA

Labels: Pop Culture, Practical Advice, twitter

The Clarion Content is delighted to announce, as some of you have already heard, that we are partnering with the Bull City Connector for our next Fashion Drive-by, Fashion in Transit. The clothes will be provided by the Independent's Men clothier of the year, Vert & Vogue.

We will have our usual superlative Fashion Drive-by team, photographer, Jessica Arden, and Creative Director, Cady Childs.



The Clarion Content is stoked to support the bus.

We are big believers in the ecological and communal returns of mass transit. The bus has so many rewards. There are obvious benefits; saving on gas, no parking issues, being able to knock back a tipple or two without driving. And there are subtler benefits; meeting your neighbors, understanding the geography of our community, the positive feeling of having played a part in reducing pollution and waste, helping push the mass transit mindset.

The Clarion Content is proud to be in and of Durham. We make a concerted effort to support the green¹ in our community and we believe Durham does the same.


Notes
¹We like green initiatives, ideas and projects of all ilks. If we are missing out on yours, please send it our way! Info@ClarionContent dot com. All one word dot is the symbol "."

Labels: Durham, ecology, Fashion, Fashion Drive-bys, infrastructure, Politics, Practical Advice, vehicles

A fantastic new service called CompostNow has debuted in Durham and the surrounding area. A tip of the hat to a fellow member of the Watts-Hillandale Neighborhood Association for sending this our way. They heard about them through the ahead the curve cats over at Bull City Forward.





For $25 a month, CompostNow provides a homeowner with a composting bin; you fill it up, they pick it up, once a week. Homeowners then have the option of having the resulting nutrient-rich, garden-ready compost delivered to them whenever and wherever at no extra charge. Or, CompostNow members can also choose to donate the compost to a local community garden of their choice.

Labels: Durham, ecology, Practical Advice, science

The Clarion Content had the opportunity this weekend to listen to renown personal development and leadership trainer Dennis Gaddy speak. Mr. Gaddy came on a Saturday on his own time, like three folks have before him and four more will after him,¹ to address a group of nearly a hundred young men.

These men participate in the DBL, a free Durham youth basketball league, the brainchild of local community organizer, Otis Lyons. Regular readers are familiar with this story, the twelve to sixteen year-old ballers in this league have to attend these educational workshops or they don't play in that week's games.



Mr. Gaddy dished out some knowledge to these young souls, who whether they are know are not, are facing a reality that says it is extremely unlikely that even one of them earns their living playing basketball professionally. While Mr. Gaddy used some basketball analogies to reach them, it was patently clear to this observer that he knew this hard truth. The five keys to a gameplan that wins were applicable to a far bigger stage than the basketball court.


1) You will become what you think about

Sounds simple enough. But what if you play violent videogames on the console all day and watch the latest viral hits on Youtube all night? What if you listen to music with dehumanizing, abrasive, negative lyrics and stereotypes for hours on end?

What is your mind dwelling on?

Mr. Gaddy coached these men that the mind is a garden and one reaps what one sows.

It makes perfect sense to your Clarion Content correspondent, how does one become a good basketball player (beyond pre-existing talents) or how does one hone one's skills at anything one loves from woodworking to playing the violin to writing iambic pentameter sonnets?? By living, breathing, and thinking on it all day.

Mr. Gaddy, his voice dropping another register, warned the impressionable minds, "It is happening all the time. You will become what you think about, what you surround yourself with, regardless of your intentions, you will reap what you have sown."

We believe, Mr. Gaddy. We believe.


2) A set of goals

Have a vision. Write it down. Literally.² Say it every day. Aloud. Those familiar with mantras will understand the formulation. Express the change you wish to be.

Aye, Mr. Gaddy, we believe. We believe.



3) Have a good attitude

A positive mental attitude goes a long way, further than one even realizes, would be the summary here. Your correspondent also already subscribes to this one. This is interrelated with the first key, as Mr. Gaddy noted. If you are what you think about; you are positive or negative in corresponding measure.

It rains a lot? Are you going to be down every time it does? Who can you call about the weather is one of the Clarion Content's favorite old saws... Mr. Gaddy noted, continuing his garden analogy, what you plant in other people is what they give back. Treat them as a default option like they are somebody and they are more likely return that grace and respect.³

Mr. Gaddy, playing to his audience, did a quick segue through the importance of politeness and the signifiers thereof, on his Yes list; please, excuse me, my fault, thank you, you're welcome... on the No list; yeah, uh-huh, what and um. Call us old-fashioned if you will, but we believe, Mr. Gaddy, it serves young people well to hear this explicitly.


4) Have character and integrity

Seemingly tricky concepts to sum up for a group of adolescents, Mr. Gaddy boiled it down to 'who are you when nobody is looking.' If you are true to yourself and your word, you only have to remember one story, the truth. Do what you say you are going to, he continued, have accountability, pairing the concept and the definition neatly. This means follow-through, again, even if if nobody is watching at the moment it happens, do it anyway. Do what you said you would. The little things get noticed.

Here Mr. Gaddy brought the boys back to basketball, do you know who does the little things on the court on your team, he asked, presumably meaning running back on defense, getting hands in the passing lane, making the extra pass.

Do you know who else does?

He reminded these young men about their coaches. How come they know your game, he queried. He talked about the importance of mentors and what it means to be too close to one's self and the process to sometimes see what one is doing. He explained how one has to be open to it to have a mentor and one has to actively respect a teacher to best learn from them. He articulated how those observers and those leaders can help mold people, if we listen, if we approach with the right attitude; with positivity and integrity, his hands chopping the air with passion.

Believers, your correspondent and the young men present, nodded and murmured.


5) Read

It sounds simple enough, but as Mr. Gaddy noted, fewer and fewer people are reading these days. Your correspondent had just heard the very same thing days earlier, about no less a select group than NC State engineering students.

But Mr. Gaddy would not hear of it. (pun intended)

Readers are leaders, he told the group. He said that in the modern world the single most likely characteristic that people who make it to the "top" share was a predilection for reading. Reading might not guarantee achieving, but a lack of reading skills could spell disaster. Mr. Gaddy told us that less than 3% of people literally write out their goals.

If you simply take your goals, your plans and put pen to paper, you are a top three percenter, he said.

It was the optimal mix of inspiring stuff and useful knowledge poured into these young minds. We were glad to be there to witness it.



Dennis Gaddy is the Executive Director of the Community Success Initiative (CSI), a non profit organization that was created out of a desire to fill a need to see personal growth and development, and leadership principles become a recognized strategy for achieving success in the lives of everyday people, with an emphasis on men and women who are transitioning from prison and jail.


Notes

¹The speakers at these workshops so far have included, Superior Court Judge Ellen Bushfan, on "The Law and You." Principal Martina Dumsford aka Coach "D" delivered the message "Education is not Optional" and league founder Otis Lyons spoke on gangs and gang violence.

²If you have been to the Clarion Content offices, you know we already subscribe to this one. We are animals too, like the horse with the carrot, post your goals and dreams within your sight and look at them every day, it will drive you. (Possibly we got this one from Mr. Gilbreth?)

³While a cynic might call b.s. here, all but the most hardened Hobbesian, would have to concede the contrapositive: treating people disrespectfully, like they are less than somebody, makes them likely to return that treatment in kind. Or as one might say, in the vernacular, "If you wants some, bring it on, Muthableeper."

Labels: Durham, Practical Advice, thought

The Clarion Content is delighted to offer up another column from regular contributor Catherine Howard. Ms. Howard is a whirlwind of activity and very much in the middle of the Durham artistic milieu. She is a visual artist, an art history instructor, and a curator.

And she is about to take the show on the road to Cape Town, South Africa. She addresses her fears, does and don'ts (mostly the don'ts) of preparing for a very big trip. She wants to hear from you, dear readers: tips and tricks, things to do and things to avoid.



Fingers crossed for the safe arrival of your luggage.


How to ruin an International Trip

by: Catherine Howard


We all travel – a commute to work, a road trip to visit family, a short plane ride for a weekend, or the few steps from the couch to the bathroom. Maybe every once in a while, though, some of us hop on a plane for a 30-hour flight to the other side of the world, too.

On February 29th, I embark on a two-month trip to Cape Town, South Africa. Thanks to the backing from many wonderful folks, I will be attending the "A Word of Art" residency program to work on my personal artwork and coordinate community art classes for children in the Woodstock neighborhood.

During the art classes, the kids and I will create drawings of our "ideal neighborhoods" and talk about them together. I will also fashion a giant maze (or maybe a big blanket fort – we’ll see what fits the space best) and cover it in the kids’ drawings and portraits, I will draw of each of the children who participated in the classes. Then, folks from all over Cape Town will be invited to come play a giant game of Hide & Seek in this “ideal neighborhood” during the opening reception.

Now, this will be my first international flight, so what was my first move? Google searching “how to pack to leave the country”, which resulted in a wide range of wonderfully helpful advice. However, in my discussions with frequent world travelers, the horror stories were even better than the logical advice:

How To Ruin an International Trip

• Start making a packing list the day before you leave.

• Pack only summer clothes without realizing that summer in one hemisphere means that it’s winter in the hemisphere where you’re going.

• Lose your itinerary with your hotel’s address.

• Leave your cell phone on and rack up massive roaming fees.

• Lose your passport without having ever made a photocopy.

• Wander excitedly around a city gazing upwards at the architecture and then wonder how someone pickpocketed you.

• Pack only sandals and get horrible blisters after day two.


• Forget to inform your bank that you are traveling and have your debit card blocked when you are trying to buy groceries on your first day in a new country.

• Get food poisoning and have no idea where the closest pharmacy is. Once you find a pharmacy, realize that Pepto-Bismol is not a universal term used all over the world, and that no one here knows what that is.

• Pack more suitcases than you can carry by yourself.

• Leave your bag (your computer and cell phone and ticket and passport in it) in the front seat of your unlocked car while you go to pay gas. Come back to the car to find that it has been stolen.


My luggage is almost fully packed. I’m still debating on whether I can really fit the 16 inch tall ceramic Buddha head that my family wants me to photograph in every location that I go. My travel bitch-face is ready (for all of you that think I am only a congenial, sweet woman, walk around a big city with me – I’ll terrify you).

But I know I’m forgetting something. Something will go wrong. Help me prevent at least one more possible disaster. What are your international travel horror stories?

Labels: Africa, Catherine Howard columns, Practical Advice

This isn't your usual job searching advice. Rather this is the Clarion Content's Practical Advice, simple heads up tips that we have heard and want to pass along. In this case the advice we heard concerns job searching and personal privacy.

When replying to Craigslist and other job search websites, one of the most irritating pieces of the process is the spam that it produces. Our job counselor recommended creating a new separate email address for your job search. GMail, Yahoo and Hotmail are all free. By creating a new email address, you don't jam up your existing email address, the one that all of your friends and relatives have, with unwanted spam.

This technique also makes you more focused on your job search, because when you are checking emails about job searching, there won't be any goofy forwards or angst ridden emails from long lost relatives to interrupt you. If no one but parties related to your job search has the email address you are using, you won't be distracted by frivolous and/or social email.

Another job searching tip, along these same lines that we heard for responding to internet job ads, send your resume without your street address. Again it cuts down on junk mail, employers who will have your email and phone number from your resume, are not upset not to have your street address, especially if you still include your city, state of residence. Legitimate employers are not looking to mail you anything and if they are, they will have reached out and made personal contact long before then. Spammers and junk mailers trolling for addresses won't be bothered to look you up, if you don't give it away.

Labels: Practical Advice

A romp through Parker & Otis

by Cady Childs
our lead columnist for Durham, Culture, Fashion and Style



¹The Clarion Content can verify that Jennings learned this one from personal experience too... ;)

Labels: Cady Childs columns, Durham, Pop Culture, Practical Advice

Warning! Warning! There is a Twitter password stealing scam rocketing through the ether. Please be careful. The Clarion Content just gotten taken in and nearly had our account hijacked. The bot scam comes at your Twitter through a direct message that says, "I found a fun photo of you" or a "cool photo of you," and there is a tiny url, that one might presume to be the photo.

Watch out!!! It is not. It redirects you to a site which asks you to verify your Twitter username and password. Type that data in there: and BAM! It is stolen. The redirect from that site after you give up your username and password takes you to a generic sales site. There is no picture of you. No. No. No. Nada. Don't get duped.

Warning! Warning!

Labels: Practical Advice, technology

The Clarion Content is an avid follower of the bemusing and outlandish smut that is published over at Texts from Last Night...



The best one we have seen in a while appeared yesterday, from the 678 area code.

I'm sorry. But when a stripper driving a Bentley tells me I have potential..... I gotta at least listen to her proposal. God did not mean for me to waste these tits on law school.

Whoa.

Labels: humor, Pop Culture, Practical Advice

Sometimes the internet kicks up a beauty. Scouring YouTube for something else entirely, we found this gem.

Labels: po et tree, Practical Advice, thought

As if we need another reason to love the gorgeous and charming Mila Kunis...



Nonetheless she found one, in the process probably making some Marine's month or year.

What happened? Marine Sergeant Scott Moore took the advice we frequently proffer around here at the Clarion Content. Don't be afraid to ask out the prettiest girl in the room! She is a person like everybody else, and because she is such a hottie, many dudes are too intimidated to say, boo. Missing out, in Mila's case, on a kind, sweet, caring person, who when Sgt. Moore posted a video on YouTube asking Mila go to the Marine Corps Ball with him next month, said, what else, YES.

Gentleman, it never hurts to ask.

Sgt. Moore who is serving with the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Marines in Afghanistan, posted a plea titled "Go With Me Mila" last week. Word spread and before long, Justin Timberlake was asking Mila about it.

In his video, filmed outside a bunker in Afghanistan, Sgt. Moore says, "Hey Mila, Sgt. Moore, but you can call me Scotty. I just want to take a moment out of my day to invite you to the Marine Corps Ball with yours truly. So take a second to think about it and get back to me. All right, bye now."

Mila will be there showing her support for the troops November 18 in Greensville, North Carolina.

You go, girl!

Read more here.

Labels: Pop Culture, Practical Advice

Returning to the pages of the Clarion Content for the first time in over a year, his last dispatches were filed from Africa, check them out here and here, we heartily and gratefully welcome back, JCoop, this time filing his report from Honduras. Follow his adventures on his own blog here. To check out other Clarion Content guest columnists, and we have had a passel of good ones, click here and scroll down.

Mountain Biketastrophe in Honduras

It took a mountain biking accident today to inspire the revival of this column (almost assuredly a short-lived revival). The plan for Saturday was to head up to Parque la Tigra, the first national park in Honduras, in the mountains about 22 km outside of the capital of Tegucigalpa. I was there last weekend with some friends, and took my new Honduran mountain bike along to bomb down the steep road from the park. I would ride up while my three friends took the truck, we'd hike in the park for 5 or 6 hours, then we'd come down from the mountain, again me on the bike and them in the car.




The road is like many rural roads in Honduras, made of rock, dirt, and gravel, and wide enough for one car, where passing is only possible in certain places or if one car goes into the ditch. It makes for some excellent off-road biking, with stunning mountain views and all the dogs and chickens you could possibly hope to narrowly avoid.

This week, I had carefully conditioned and prepared myself to not only bike down from the park, but also on the way up to the park (the strict training regiment mostly involved abstaining from generous helpings of Honduran beer the night before the ride). The road is quite steep in many places, with loose gravel contributing to tire slippage. It's about 12 km to the top, with the last 3 km being particularly steep and loose -- the sort of riding where you put it in granny low gear, spin like crazy, and inch up the hill praying that it will flatten out a little around the next corner. Anyway, this week I was determined to get to the top to earn the reward of the downhill after our day hiking at the park.

About 2 km from the park came the last big descent before the steepest and longest hill leading all the way to the park entrance. It was a pretty long, straight, and steep descent with a corner at the bottom. I had been feeling good all morning and was carving the corners pretty well, so I probably carried to much speed into this one, maybe 25mph. As I got close to the corner and looked for a place to brake, the road got looser and had some nice ruts in it. After binding up the brakes, it became apparent in a split-second that I was going to eat it. Despite hours spent on the bike, my inner ear has never been my best quality, so fortunately for me I have crashing just about down to an art at this point. I went down on my left side, hitting my knee then hip then elbow as I tucked and rolled onto my back where I rode out about a 10-ft. slide down the hill.




Upon coming to rest in the middle of the road, I knew immediately that I wasn't seriously hurt and nothing was broken. Sweet. If I had stuck out a hand or foot to break the fall it might not have turned out so well for the respective limb. My cyclocross instincts kicked in and I hopped up quickly to haul my bike and body out of harm's way to the ditch on the side of the road. I sat down to wait for my friends following in the truck.

I knew I was in a little pain, but I hadn't had a chance to assess the damages yet. At this point, was still entertaining the idea that I could continue to the park in the truck and go hiking with them, or at least hang out at the visitor's center while they got their sight-seeing in. I knew how much Alan was looking forward to the 5-hour hike to the park's famous 40-meter waterfall that we hadn't had time for the weekend before. I took a peek at my throbbing knee, an noticed that there were some pretty deep and dirty lacerations with the skin flayed back. Blood was already pooling on my sock. I poured some of my water over it to clean it a little, at least superficially.




Being the pragmatic sort that I am, my thoughts quickly turned to what I had done wrong, and how I could prevent the same outcome in a similar situation in the future. I identified three tactics I could have employed.

• First and most obviously I could have started my braking further up the hill where I might have found better traction. If I hadn't come into the corner so hot, it could have been easily negotiated. Chalk it up to hubris.


• There was a small grassy patch on the outside of the corner with a fence behind it. If I had steered that way I wouldn't have made the corner, but I probably could have found a way to decrease my velocity and find a softer patch of ground to land on. I might have been able to just dust myself off and keep riding after that.


• I don't have video of my crash to analyze, but I will almost guarantee that my weight was too far forward -- a nasty habit I have when braking on downhills. This puts all the weight on the front wheel and causes the nasty fishtailing that led to my crash. If my butt had been hanging out over the back wheel where it should be in that situation, I might have stayed upright. 

When I got home later in the afternoon, I decided to consult an expert source.



To my dismay, I learned that my crash was not caused by any of the isolated faults listed above, but something more troubling: a lack of belief in myself. This is a not a problem I was aware that I had. Could this lack of belief manifest itself in other ways to undermine other endeavors? Has this condition led to shortcoming in other facets of my life, unbeknowst to me? If so, how long has this been going on? Months? Years? And most importantly, is there anything I can do to resolve this issue?

Fortunately, after pausing the video and writing the above paragraph, I continued on to learn that the solution was to "just keep practicing". This tactic can lead to many desirable outcomes including:

• getting the hang of it


• getting better and better at it


• knowing how to ride a bike


• feeling happy of myself


• thumbs up for rock and roll

After getting to the side of the road, all that remained was to relax as much as possible and wait for my friends who were following along not far behind in the truck (because of how rough and curvy the roads are, most stretches can actually be navigated more quickly on a bicycle). My friends wisely talked me into returning to town to get checked out and cleaned up. I still feel really bad that they didn't get a chance to make it up to the waterfall, but now there'll be another reason that Alan has to return to Honduras and work with me again in the future (haha! I sure showed him!).




I'm lucky to have such good friends, who cleaned my wound with water, bandaged it with their T-shirt, and got me to the clinic where I got my abrasions and cuts cleaned up. The doctor told me he would have to put two stitches in my knee to close the wound. One of my friends gave me 3 sticks of gum to chew on during the process, and I got a tight grab of a pillow with my good arm. My friends told me that it was OK if I needed to cry, because we are all friends, and they wouldn't tell anyone. I was very touched by their support and understanding in these circumstances. But I didn't cry, because what kind of sissy little bitch to you take me as?




I got some local anesthetic, so the stitches didn't hurt too bad. I ended up needing four in total. The worst part was when the doctor grabbed my knee and twisted it all around from side to side to make sure all my ligaments were intact. My ligaments responded by saying, "Ow, stop yanking on us, you jerk". Then he did the same thing to the good knee, just to make sure both were equally responsive and uncomfortable.

And that's pretty much it. Fortunately I have two days to recuperate before getting back to work on Monday.

Labels: Guest columns, Practical Advice

How about this precarious load?



We hear you can get $5.00 a pallet.

Labels: photos, Pop Culture, Practical Advice, vehicles

Much like the watched pot, the too closely observed upload never finishes.

Labels: Practical Advice

Get gas when you're not late.

Get your suit dry-cleaned right after you wear it. Leave it hanging in the closet cleaned and pressed in case of emergencies.

Labels: Practical Advice

Welcome to our latest edition of Pithy F*rging Sayings gathered from the singularity.

As always the citation of these sayings, quotes and dialogues does not necessarily imply endorsement, the goal is to provoke thought.

"Perhaps then the old trinity of Truth, Goodness and Beauty is not simply the dressed-up, worn-out formula we thought… If the crowns of these three trees meet, and if the too obvious, too straight sprouts of Truth and Goodness have been knocked down, cut off, not let grow, perhaps the whimsical, unpredictable, unexpected branches of Beauty will work their way through, rise up to that very place, and thus complete the work of all three?"---Alexander Solzhenitsyn


"The plural of anecdote is not data."---The MEP Report


"Resist the urge to use capitalization as emphasis."---Staff

"Do not accept what you cannot change. Change what you cannot accept."---source disputed

Labels: Practical Advice, Sayings

It is not that there is no accounting for taste, it is that there is no holding anyone to account for their taste.

Labels: Practical Advice, Sayings