Okay, so recent posts have been an exercise for you, the dear reader, that you may increasingly distance that which you find on the internet (and especially on blogs) from that which you find in reality. There is nowhere that truth exists as ethereally as on the worldwide web. Personal blogs are definitionally subjective, exagerrated, mythic, and in the end, unsubstantiatible. Even more mythic than the facts and stories represented online are the personalities. Are people whom they seem on the net? Perhaps. But history, experience, and my own personal genius tells me otherwise. Plus the fact that I am not real. Doubt me? Read once more the site's Disclaimer. People ask if The Dane is really Danish. Well of course he is. He can be anything he wants because, well, in point of fact, he is a fabrication. So, he is 100% Danish. He's also 100% Californian depending on my mood and which lie I want to tell you today. Now now, don't feel sad or disillusioned. Really, once one recognizes the web as one of deceit rather than of information, the true power of the web becomes apparent. It's about ideas rather than facts. And an idea can be carried through a fiction oftimes better than it can through a fact. The sooner you can get yourself used to this idea, the better you'll survive in the world around you. So, is there really such a person as ex-cute girl? Maybe, but probably not. Is Johnny T just an elaborate creation allowing me to be extra silly and to slough off the rigours of proper spelling and grammar? Maybe not so elaborate. Do I really design websites for a living? Does it matter? When I post letters from friends and readers and then critique them, do those friends really exist? And if so, did they ever write me? Maybe maybe maybe. But probably not. Am I really The Dane, Seth, Michael, Frances, or any of the other things people call me? Naw, but whatever you wanna call me is fine. Whatever makes you happy and won't distract you from the entertainment of reading, responding, and thinking what a jerk this Danish fellow is. P.S. I have no idea who Bruce is.

Last week a woman was mauled and killed by a great white shark off the coast of California. This morning, the average Californian's world was once more rocked by the discovery that 13,000 ants working in harmonious concert slowly and discreetly devoured the occupants of of a townhouse in Rancho Santa Margarita over the space of two weeks. Neighbors believed the family of six had departed on a summer vacation. Because the tragedy occured so close to my office, I walked over Friday morning to take pictures of the site. Because police tape still marked the townhouse proper as off limits, I settled upon the evidence on the house's outskirts. From what I'm told, the infestation apparent on these sidewalks only represents a fraction of the mass of anthills found inside (the two year old was entirely buried in a massive anthill and only 2% of the living room was free of the granular substance).

Here are four very adequate reasons not to host your wedding (nor look forward to one that is hosted) at 6:oo pm outdoors facing the sunset in August.


Additionally, a friend's father remarked on the bride's entrance (across the lake's waters via a decorated white boat): "I really wasn't that impressed by the whole boat thing. I mean, if she had walked across the lake, well yeah, but... the boat? Nah."

Last week a woman was mauled and killed by a great white shark off the coast of California. This morning, the average Californian's world was once more rocked by the discovery that 13,000 spiders working in harmonious concert slowly and discreetly devoured the occupants of of a townhouse in Rancho Santa Margarita over the space of two weeks. Neighbors believed the family of six had departed on a summer vacation. Because the tragedy occured so close to my office, I walked over Friday morning to take pictures of the site. Because police tape still marked the townhouse proper as off limits, I settled upon the evidence on the house's outskirts. From what I'm told, the infestation apparent in these bushes only represent a fraction of the mass of webbing found inside (the two year old was entirely cocooned and only 2% of the living room was free of the gossamer substance).

Wednesday night, Johnny, Blakey, Levy, and Noely (Johnny's boy-in-law) all trekked up to Hollywood Bowl to see MMW perform along with Roy Hargrove and the John Scofield band. Oh yeah. I went with them. Aurally, it was an amazing experience. Medeski, Martin, and even Wood were astounding in their ecclectic virtuosity.

The show was hosted by 88.1 KKJZ (formerly the reknowned KLON) and was entitled, "The Edge of Jazz"; I never really thought of MMW as jazz 'til now. I think the appellation fits. They employ a standard jazz trio - piano (well, organ sumptin' thingee), bass, and drums - and are highly improvisatory. I think my assumption of jazz has been too rigid in the past. I'm used to Coltrane, Brubeck, Ellington, Armstrong, Desmond, Mulligan, Davis, Brown, etc. MMW is a far cry from cool or bop or even mainstream. In some instances, they even approach cacophonic. But in a good way. Scratch that. A wonderful way.

All in all, the show was incredible - albeit a touch too brief (the Bowl seems to have a sound curfew at 11:oo). Roy Hargrove and the RH Factor had moments of genius (a guitar solo here a pounding percussion duet there), but was marred by its saxophone (really, are there any saxophonists that don't sound cheesey-Kenny-G? I mean besides Trane, Bird, and those of the cool jazz era?). John Scofield et al were simply astonishing and I gotta say I enjoyed them nearly as much as the headlining trio! John wishes he lived in New York so he could see MMW more often. Being more pragmatic and less the dreamer, I wish MMW lived next door to me in Laguna so I could hear them all the time. And that is that.

Yesterday, I nearly came home with a fresh-squeezed kitten. Nearly the size of my hand, said kitten was fluffy grey and that kind of adorable that begs to be squooshed into a neat and tidy ball of love. I thought about said kitten and how I might name it "Roger" if it were a boy kitten or "Howard" if it were a gril kitten. I loved thinking about said kitten in this manner and grew to strong affection for the creature rapidly. I loved nothing so much as I loved Roger/Howard in that instant.

Then I began to imagine how said kitten would not be smaller than my hand for long. I thought about how fluffy grey balls of adorable squooshiness stop being squooshy and adorable. Sometimes they even stop being grey. In my reverie, the kitten became a cat and no longer was I able to call it Roger or Howard but only Spencer if it were a man cat or maybe Richard if it were a woman cat. In this dread moment, I hated said cat and realized I would never be able to witness Roger/Howard's horrifying metamorphosis.

No. It would almost be better to eat said kitten while still youthful, still free, and still grey.

As I approached the little girl whose cardboard box housed Roger/Howard, a short and wiry Cambodian woman stepped up in front of me and asked if the kitten was free. It was of course and the woman gleefully packed Roger/Howard under her arm and sauntered away licking her lips. Alas poor Roger/Howard. I knew him, Horatio. I did at that. I can only take my rest in the fact that Spencer/Richard shall never come to be and my poor Roger/Howard will be spared of such shame.

Reading articles like this always discourage me. Why is it that Christians are so often the most angrily discriminating people around? So what if a private business decided "Y'know what? We probably oughtta be treating people as though they were people despite the private sins they harbour" - no really, who cares? And is that really so bad? That a company should treat a homosexual employee the same as a divorcee or and adulterer or a fornicator or a gossip or a Republican or a liar or, or, or even the same as it treats hard-hearted, uncharitible Christians who practice bigotry and hatred on a daily basis with pride and dilligence? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, here?

Focus on the Family is profoundly disappointed that the largest family-friendly company in the nation has surrendered to a small handful of homosexual activists and will subject 1.3 million employees to ‘sensitivity training’ on homosexual issues.

Watch out. WallyWorld has surrendered to the Legion of Doom and will likely be featuring homosexual How To demonstrations in the toy aisles very soon. Rubbish. I am a Christian and Focus on the Family embarrasses me.

Uproar over recent Icelandic whaling expeditions causes me to again wonder why the hubbub in regard to the extinction of certain species (not that the minke whale is going to go extinct anytime soon), especially in light of the generally materialistic (in terms of existence rather than desire) ideology of the environmentalist movement. Really, now. What ever happened to natural selection. How are we going to ever live in a world inhabited by super-minkes if we don't cull the species? And if the species isn't good enough to make the cut? So be it. There's like a bazillion more animals out there hungry to take the minke's place—amibitious creatures with the will and the guts it takes to survive. I say: Give 'em the chance! I say: Let's find the heroes of the animal kingdom! I say: Let's get ready to Rummmmmmm-ble!

Just so you all know, I had plenty of power all day yesterday.

Welcome to the new and improved Nowheresville, USA! I have entirely reconfigured the site to make it completely accessible to the hearing impaired. I hope all our new audio-declined users will enjoy these improvements and spread the word that there really are people who care and are trying to make the world a better place for the less fortunate.

Yesterday's meeting forced me to rely upon the E•Lektrik Bug•A•Loo for comfort and guidance. Danced a web of intrigue as the minnuts, to-do lists, and operational reports ticked by.

The one thing about fiction that I just cannot become interested in is scenery. When reading of the fictional lives of people, I want to hear about those lives. I want to hear about their actions, their thoughts, their history, their beliefs, their reactions, and yes, even their reactions to the environment about them. But don't—please don't—give me two to three pages describing the forest the characters are in. Adjectives are boring. Besides. I know what a forest looks like. Just let me know in three sentence or preferably less the kind of forest their in and then let their story unfold. That's what the reader is there for anyway. The one breaker of this rule I can abide is Chandler, who does describes the world Philip Marlowe inhabits, but never takes himself seriously in the doing of it. He merely uses the description of environ as opportunity to make me laugh—and if there's one thing I respect, it's someone who is both willing and able to make me laugh.

The best argument for censorship I have ever read.

Veggie Tales is in trouble and Big Idea CEO, Steve Vischer, blames his mistaken conception of God's will for their poor financial practices. Well, not it so many words....

We really got ourselves upside down financially when everything was working so wonderfully. When things were doing so well, I thought that was God wanting us to expand, so we grew like crazy. Now I think it was more me having all these great ideas in my head and being so excited that I wanted to do them all at once.

Really, I can sympathize. I both have a milion-and-three ideas that I want to accomplish IN THIS VERY MINNUT and I was once led to believe that God makes His will known through so deeply subjective experiences as success and prosperity. Fortunately, older and wiser believers taught me through there words and writing to ascribe the wishes of God for my life to only two things: His revealed will as seen in the properly-interpreted pages of Scripture and His revealed will as witnessed via direct and extraordinary revelation (a la Moses, Paul, Peter, et cetera). Once, I too imagined that every little circumstance had deep inherent meaning and needed to be interpreted and "listened to" so that I too could be in that club of the faithful who knew God's will for their lives.

More than anything, I feel bad for Big Idea and its couple hundred laid-off employees who have joined thousands upon thousands of believers in that unofficial organization known as Hurt By a Christian Mythology International. When will the madness stop? When? (Johnny knows the answer ;-)

This is what my calendars typically look like after a Monday staff meeting.

There's kind of a buzzphrase that spins in and out of one of my spheres of Christendom (well, I guess it never really spins out) that I've been thinking about recently. I'm not certain how valid the idea is and would appreciate any insights that might make me more comfortable with it. So...is the concept of "stepping out in faith" biblical?

I'm not asking whether or not Christians quit there jobs, move across the country, and hope that God will provide them funds enough to support the move. I know Christians do that. And I also know that God will sometimes bless some of these excursions beyond expectation.

What I want to know is if there is any biblical warrant for suspecting that this is a fairly normal occurance in the life of the believer today. I don't want experience. I don't want subjective interpretation of personal events. I want Scripture. Nothing more. Nothing less. Thanks. Yer pals.

Over the last few weeks, my morning reading has been comprised of nothing but novels (Pattern Recognition, Harry Potter V, Cat's Cradle, High Fidelity, Snow Falling on Cedars, East of the Mountains, and others). I decided that today was the morning I would vary my reading. Now I've had Bahnsen's By This Standard on my shelf for about four years and have always meant to read it but just could never get in the mood.

So I read the first fifty pages this morning.

I think tomorrow that I'm going to begin Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man. That fact was, in Bahnsen, I was merely substituting one kind of fiction for another. And lemme tell you: Bahnsen loses out big time when it comes to things like plot, character development, mise-en-scène, climax, dénouement. He misses out with a dull and listless style. His stuctures are both tired and awkward. Though Bahnsen's yarns are breathtaking in their scope, he has neither the charm of Vonnegut's equally madcap schema, nor does he possess Rowling's ability to invest the reader into the adventure, nor does he evoke that turgid empathy that seems so commonplace in Guterson.

To be short, Bahnsen falls flat and if I want to spend my time involved in bad fiction, I'd be better served reading Yu-Gi-Oh—at least that's culturally relative.

Yep. It's doodle time again. But this time, I only offer five. The first illustrates the kind of stuff that likely lives in the toilet at work (and would be made known if only we plunged hard enough). The second, quite obviously, are lilies (of a sort). The third is the product of a dull lunch where the food took forever to reach me (it's drawn on a napkin - needless to say, I had to be very careful eating when the food at last did arrive so as not to smudge my art with teriyaki sauce). The fourth is the kind of random weirdness that adorns all my official to-do lists. And the fifth is illustrative of my common pasttime: filling in the date boxes on my weekly calendar. Interesting to note here is how I obviously prefer action that moves from right to left in the frame. Oh yeah, in case you didn't catch it, the 9th features a jet fighter going down in flames with the pilot ejecting. Cheers.

I have now officially read two books that were better realized in their cinematic expression than in their written form. The first was James Fenimore Cooper's Last of the Mohicans, which became one of the greatest action/adventures of all time when brought to the sceen by Michael Bay Mann [apologies, I don't know how on earth Bay got his name in there] in 1992. Bay's vision and Daniel Day Lewis's portrayal of the lead envigorated a book that, in reality, was only a good adventure instead of the great adventure I wanted it to be. The second, and just finished last night, was David Guterson's Snow Falling on Cedars. To be certain, the book is wonderful, acting both as courtroom drama and as human exploration; but the film shines and reveals in a way that words just cannot accomplish. I can't possibly imagine a fan of the book being disappointed with Scoot Hicks's translation of the drama, as he ably involves nearly every important nook and cranny of the novel's. There are a few exceptable omissions and some alteration of the ending (and I think it comes off better for it), but really so what? The more I see the film, the more it fascinates me. And as much as i loved the book, I'll never read it again. Peace, yo.