Bruce + Shepard Fairey + NE Installation

Great work, Bruce. Having the time of your life!

--UPDATE--

Some people are having a hard time seeing the full screen in their browsers, so instead of trouble-shooting, I am going to be lazy. Link below:

http://www.northeastern.edu/news/multimedia/video.html?contentID=l8yPyjF0jkKzSYFIPiWN-g

Plantation Blinds

Took me a little while to get these posted, but here they are. The new plantation blinds we had installed late last month. Custom fabricated, locally made, good wood.

Living room



Dining Room



Office



Office (Another View)

Floors + Refinished + Good Wood

Last week we had our oak floors refinished, and the results were amazing. All the stains left virtually undetectable, they shine, baby... In this previous post or even this one, you can almost see how bad they really were.



Living Room



Dining Room



Stairs



Upstairs Hall



Main Bedroom



Second Bedroom



Walk-in Closet

The King of Comedy

If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. Wow.

Arlington

Sad + Alarming + Can't put this thought together

I find it it terribly sad. I find it incredibly alarming. As details trickle in about today's horrific shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial, I am struck by another tragedy just a couple weeks ago — the tragic killing of Dr. George Tiller.

Acts of hate. Acts of cowardice. These two murders are very different, from an ideological point of view of course, but they are alarmingly similar in too many ways to list.

At their root, though: These are acts of domestic terrorism, and should be treated as such.

Please understand that I am not one to use the word terrorism without thinking it through. I do not attribute it to just any crime. I do not simply attribute the moniker to crimes of intolerance, crimes based on religious views, hate, or bigotry. Even though these are often the defining characteristics of such acts. I do, however, find that acts of terrorism are rooted in an ideology gone terribly astray. An ideology, at its surface, that may seem to have no malice. But eventually, on it's fringes attracts the most dangerous type of subscriber. An individual or group of individuals who would impress upon us all their agenda through the most savage means possible: By preying on the innocent.

As a last thought:
I am also alarmed that the same DHS report (issued in April) that has been demonized as a useless act of partisan zealotry warned of acts of domestic terrorism by these very fringe elements in this country. Maybe we should start paying attention to rabid ideology within our borders.

Baseball Package

How do I feel? Fan-fucking-tastic. That's how.

I finally have the MLB Extra Innings baseball package (and cable for that matter). This has been a long time coming, no doubt. It saves me money in beer consumption costs at bars, plus I can watch every damn Sox game this season, not just the random nationally televised event. Home games are on NESN. Oh, how I've missed you, NESN. Eck is doing a heck'uva job filling in for Rem-Dog. Even though he dedicate 10 minutes in the 7th las night to apologizing for not recognizing we were throwing at Jeter. Fuck Jeter.

Plus, and I know this isn't a coincidence, Papi has had a hit in six straight games. There is faith, there is hope, I do not want him to fade away. Ol' Big Guy. I think my watching has something to do with this.

True story.

Great Vodka

Tito's vodka rocked my Saturday night. Great small batch distillery out of Austin, pumping out a miracle in a bottle. Clean with vanilla notes. Smooth on the rocks. I suggest a bottle. Or two. Greap price. Good times.

And further good times were had on Sunday. Finally had the FiOS installed and it is bad ass. No better way to spend a hangover than to watch the Sox beat Toronto handily. Pop over to Hockey, watch the 2006 Home Run Derby, and finish with a nightcap of Iron Chef. Why did I hold off on cable so long? Since College? Because I'm cheap and I like looking down at people who talk about their favorite TV shows.

Finally my dog has a real American father. Fat, Hungover, in front of a TV that sports over 300 channels of useless crap. Oh yeah.

Mike Tyson + Movie + Interview

This is the interview with James Toback, the director of Tyson, I mentioned yesterday. It is darn good radio listening.

Part 1 | Part 2

For more Elliot in the Morning goodness, go here.

To my devoted staff:

Please stop writing all those blogs, emails, and posts to Twitter on my behalf. I didn't even know I had a Twitter account! What purpose does it serve in our day-to-day operations?

Anyway, to my point, people are starting to think I don't really pay attention to them when they are talking. Also, you are alienating me from my friends and family.

I understand you are trying to help, but things are beginning to turn hostile.

Many Thanks,
Your steadfast manager

P.S. Great job on the "Pirate Bar." It's True Blue! Fabrice will be most pleased.

Obama + Leadership

Bare with me: This is a first draft.

Leadership does not come from simply winning. A large part in leadership comes from setting the bar ahead of where it has been, and challenging people to follow you there. To put is simply, it is guidance. It is what is happening now with Obama.

The times we are in certainly must be confronted with a vigorous new approach. The tasks we have before us are many, and the margins for failure ever smaller. The solutions require a sense of humility, and must be novel. This is a new direction forward.

Obama is benchmarking a new vision for this country. The same vision that swept him into office. He is challenging the root wisdom of many in his own party, as well as that of the opposition. He is asking the citizens of this [and other] nation(s) to move into a new dialogue, that pushes through the old arguments that have kept our policies for the most-part stagnant domestically and internationally.

This is an approach that has been met by many with scorn and admonishment. It is an approach that many feel is too moderate. But, it is just the approach that we need.

President Obama has pushed his agenda further in the first three months than any President in recent memory. As citizens, we are responsible to keep up with these changes. To educate ourselves, to form opinions, and to ask more of our government and ourselves. To demand that our voices and ideas be represented. To actively participate in our democracy.

Such sweeping policy reform is not always clear or easy to follow — but it is consistent in it's call: To grow this nation's potential will require hard work. Vision. Participation. Courage. Trust.

As a country, we can no longer just claim greatness. We must become the greatness we expect from our collective selves.

Obama's push forward requires this. Agree or disagree with the policy, he is actively guiding our nation, requiring us to dictate the directions that we now take. That is why what we are witnessing is true leadership.

Truffle + The Arthritics

All I do is paint, man. Not canvas any more. Nope, ain't got no time for that shit. I gotta paint walls. Until I get cramps in my hand. Not little cramps. Big ones. The Arthritics. The cramps last for days. If I am not painting, they tend to feel better. But that doesn't happen, because all I do is paint, man.

What you doing tonight man? Oh, I'm painting. Really, you paint quite a lot? I paint so much that I can't possibly continue to drink during every session. I am, quite literally, pickling my liver. I remember the good old days, when that blue tape came out, it was party-fucking-time. Grab a pop, turn up the radio, because we're gonna paint! Waaaazooo!

What's the color today, man? Truffle, I say. Hot damn. What's that look like? It looks like melted chocolate ice cream. Not the fancy kind of chocolate ice cream. The kind that comes in kids cups with wooden spoons. Those spoons are the same god damned type of wood that they make the stirring sticks for paint from. No shit? No shit.

[Wisdom: don't ever pay for a stirring stick, and don't ever buy paint from a place who charges for stirring sticks.]

Why's it called truffle? So assholes like me will feel better about painting my walls with it. That way I can take family and friends on a tour of my house with a wine in my cramped hand and say, see this room here? That's truffle. That room? Philadelphia Cream... they wouldn't dare call that color by it's rightful name, Melted-cheese-steak-cheese. No fucking way. But that's what it looks like.

So what are you doing tonight man? Painting. Well, I am getting Vietnamese at Eden Center and then painting.

You couldn't handle it.

Going Off The Grid + Talking Heads + Life During Wartime

I will be on a interweb technology time-out for the Easter Holiday. Black-out starts at 5pm today when I head to the bar. Hope that you all have a wonderful weekend. Don't take the Perv anywhere near Tuckerman's.

I am available to harass via my iRazor phone. I've taken to calling it that, because I feel so woefully inadequate with my lack of modern technology. I am not a Luddite. I amn't. I just have different prioriies.

I am however, quite the looker. Just ask the ladies.

Anyhow, here is your Friday Music Day installation a day in advance. So technically, it is just another music post.

Be good, be good at it.

New Idea: Life Caddie

It is raining today. Heading out for our morning commute, Wife drops her coffee. Seems the umbrella was enough to tip the scale on what is a manageable load to manage carrying.

Slipping into her seat, she declares her need for a 'Life Caddie'.

Good god damn. This is a great idea. I know in there are various forms of this role being performed daily: movie stars have assistants, politicians have handlers, and mob bosses have their Hench men... but a Life Caddie?

Someone to hold your umbrella, and carry your shit. Light your cigars and advise you on the ferocity of the wind. You know, among other things. The possibilities...

The wonderful thing is that we all have a need for one, or at least a want. A want in my world is principally the same concept as a need, just more expensive.

I would like my Life Caddie to be a crotchety old man. A dirty-joke-telling-surly-smells-like-booze-and-over-ripe-apples-and-wears-a-page-boy kinda guy. Someone who is at my door at 5 am, just waiting.

Anyway, the commute was uneventful, we arrived on schedule, it was raining harder now...

As she was getting out of the car, Wife dropped her purse in a puddle. All she said was, "Life Caddie."

And that's all she needed to say.

Best Month Ever!!!

Socially speaking, that it. First, I get kidnapped and wake up on Jesus Island.

And now... the band is getting back together! That's right, the Perv and his lovely bride-to-be will be hitting the nation's capital. I may have to invoke Prima Nocte a little earlier than planned.

Right now, I am going to get fitted for a new pair of drinking shoes. F-it. I am getting drinking cleats!

The big 3-0 is on deck and you should have seen the performance in batting practice. This could be epic, Jim...

Vitamins

Something you may not know. The fingernails on my left hand seem to grow slightly faster that those on my right. This is a bit disconcerting, but mostly makes my trimming schedule awkward. Hell, at least my face is somewhat symmetrical. That is why they say Denzel is so attractive. Because his face is perfectly symmetrical.

Denzel and me. That's what they say.

As for my feet. Well, I fear beach weddings. It is a whole other level down there, man. I gross myself out. I'm thinking about inventing something called Bed Shoes. I think the name says it all.

Anyhow. I am pretty sure that due to my pharmacopoeia of vitamins — all of which I take nightly because I am getting old and dying from the inside — that my wish for slower production of protein and keratin is nothing more than a pipe dream.

Eric + Punk Band

I think we have started a punk band. I see it as spanning out from strictly punk to some Noise-Rock type stuff. No one ever really knows. I sometimes get demos left on voicemail. Either by my band mate or by myself after my wife has gone to bed and I have had too much wine.

A purple-lipped-stained-tooth-good-for-nothin'-yawp!

We started a band a long time ago. Back when we had access to de-tuned instruments. I think it was agreed upon by letter mail. I am pretty sure it involved a type-writer. Before it ran out of ink ribbons and our booze was all gone.

We actually have three songs. In the course of 20 minutes, very punk indeed! No ink needed.

The miraculous inter-web. Oh, how things never really change.

Correction: Not Philadelphia. Jamaica!

So, I was kidnapped. I am still recovering from the excellent surprise that was a trip to Jamaica for my birthday. Not dinner in Philadelphia. Dinner in Montego Bay. I have the most amazing wife.

Sometimes the world looks perfect. I drank so much rum. So much that I am Cousin Larry Appleton. Oh, Jesus Island, I miss you.

Off to Philadelphia

Off to Philadelphia. To celebrate birthdays and law exam debauchery. Wine and friends and family. The good stuff.

I seek absinthe when I spend time in this old American city. I suppose Baltimore is a more appropriate place, if your cravings are inspired by literature. But what the hell. I am much too un-stoned for Baltimore these days. It makes me fall too sullen, most of the time.

And this brings me back to Prague. Prague was the best-worst-first-oh-god-lord-women-dancing-topless-in-hazy-windows-Eastern-European-former-Soviet-bloc experience I had with "la fée verte". I have to say, I had no idea what I was doing. But the wormwood sure did.

U Staré Paní — the burgundy basement brimming with bright jazz — wood, fabric, refracting. Candle light, bright red everywhere, it got into your head, man.

We Americans ordered beer and absinthe. We were sat at a table they carried down front. Copacabana style. A simple juice glass, very full accompanied by a box of matches, slotted spoon, sugar, and water was put within my reach. And quickly, it was late. Every faculty I had, mental or physical, was challenged after we had cashed-out/in from the Jazz haunt. Limbs and ramblings exposed for their varying degrees of disenfranchisement from my intentions.

Feet-don't-fail-me-now-TNT-spring-loaded-slippery-snow-strewn-street-watch-out-for-that-curb-cobblestone-disaster-no-I-am-fine-I-know-where-the-hotel-is-let's-have-one-more-drink.

I had no idea the night I was in for when I began. Oh, and the next day awash in a gray soot.

Prague. Philadelphia. I take it differently, now. Much slower. With intent. With a proper pour, some burned sugar cubes, and a touch of water. You can find a way to measure anything these days.

And. As family is involved, I think the absinthe will stay capped these next few days. Wine, that's what it must be. You know, for the good of the company we keep.