20080327

A couple weeks ago, the Monk and I tagged along with a couple friends to a wedding that would play host to the awesomest display of a horrible wedding sermonthing ever known. It was exuberant in its excruciation. In fact, it was as if the presiding minister, lifted up on high with face burned into sour malevolence and grave shadow, brandished his phoenix-tail-and-baobab wand with gleeful abandon, shouting over and again the harsh cry of "Crucio! Crucio! CRUCIO!!" until all before him kneeled, abject and terror-stricken.

It was difficult to suppress my own fitful humour as I watched this dark master at work.

But that is not why I write today. No, I thought that in lieu of weightier exercises, I would share the wedding card we offered in congratulations to the happy couple.* Now keep in mind that I knew neither of the participants (that pleasure belonging wholly to my companions for the afternoon's jaunt). As the four of us went halvsies on a gift, I prepared a card in all of our names. Never knowing what to say to those of whom I have been entirely ignorant up until the days leading up to the event I would be attending, I decided to go with something simple and effective, tried yet true, and several other clichés.

So, in light of the cutout sunflower card we had purchased (below replicated to the best of my abilities), I decided upon the most obvious. I decided to invoke Sauron.

I suppose The Monk should be congratulated for her willingness to allow me to take care of the greeting card duties. Our companions should also be congratulated for actually trusting me and not opening the card to make certain I wasn't going to be an embarrassment to them and their future fortunes in which the fresh-minted couple might figure. In the interest of fairness, tonight The Monk was expressing much regret, proposing that it was quite possible that the newly wed would have not the cultural cache to make sense of the card, either remaining oblivious to the identity of Sauron or not being savvy enough to recognize that the sunflower we had used bore an uncanny resemblance to the dread lord's much-ballyhooed eye.

In a way, I think The Monk's fear, if realized, makes the card that much cooler.

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*note: though not happy for long if the minister has any say in the matter.

20080324

So Easter turned out to be a great source of inspiration for me. Unfortunately, both of the great ideas I came by would do perhaps blasphemous damage to other world-faiths. Still, the ideas are rad so it may be necessary to step on a few infidel toes before the decade is up. Due to time constraints, I'll only treat one of the ideas here. It is, I think, the better of the two.

The thing that set me off was the ham. The Monk and I were tooth-and-clawing our way through a choice Golden Baked Ham and the smell was intoxicating me. It was as if the mixture of honey, brown-sugar, and glorious pork product had transported me to a whole new realm. An underheaven, if you will. That heady bouquet brought to me my first lightning-flash of genius for that day:

Ham-flavoured hookah!

Seriously, I could smoke that all day. And then it would be smoked ham! And I don't know if the ham flavouring would be mixed with the tobacco or would be innate to the hookah apparatus itself, but man, what a night that would be. And imagine if it was the hookah itself that was flavoured! Then the flavour of whichever tobacconized delicacy would mix and broil with that of the golden-baked ham aroma. It would be amazing. Apple-ham hookah! Mint-ham hookah! Strawberry-ham hookah!

Need I continue? As I said: an underheaven!

Unfortunately, The Monk reminded me that I would probably have to invent such a thing myself since it was unlikely that the largely Muslim purveyors of fine hookah products everywhere would readily break their dietary laws for something so vainglorious as the Best-Tasting Smoke Ever Crafted by Man.

20080321

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Free Half-Life 2 and Half-Life 2: Episode One giveaway! Just having purchased the Orange Box, Valve is allowing me to give the two aforementioned games away as a gift (as I had already purchased them in previous years and, as it happens (as it was meant to happen), they come packaged with the Orange Box). So interested parties should contact me with their Steam account username, I guess. And if you're hotly interested and don't have a Steam account, you should sign up for such an account and then email me.

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I'm glad I didn't read John Mark Reynold's take on marriage before I got married. I mightta been scared off for good. Actually, I take that back. There were lots of people who were pretty much always talking about how hard marriage is and how difficult their lives were and how even though marriage is awesome and they love their wives, it's still pretty much the toughest thing out there. And you know what? I was smart enough to know they were lying. The only question is: to what end?

Why were they trying to discourage young people from marriage? Was there something in it for them? Did they want to keep it as some exclusive club? Or was it worse than that: was it as bad for them as they represented? Do people really so badly fail at life that marriage is this horrible burden with occasional benefits? I suppose it's possible. But dang is that sad.

So, newsflash for all of you youngsters who are looking to get married but are chilled to the bone by the horror people make it sound like: Marriage is rad and you really have to suck at life to suck at marriage. So here's the key to a successful marriage: stop sucking at life, a'right?

A bloodless martyrdom indeed. Why I never!

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Holeeeeeee cow. Now you don't have to go all the way to India to get your hands on one. Or even in one.

p.s. I apologize for the atrocity of that pun. Mostly.

20080320

Young Schultz writes to ask:

If you don't mind my asking, how would you describe your theological education? I know you had a one point aspired to attend WS-C, did that ever come to fruition. As is obvious from all of your writings and our conversations, you are not theologically ignorant. Has most of your education consisted of private reading? Or what?

It is a worthwhile question and as I don't talk about myself nearly enough (nudgenudgewink), I thought I might share my response with you, the hapless reader. So then, of what does my education consist? Am I an academic or a gallavanting rake. Am I a liar, a cheat, and a thug? Or did I pass on a formal education to pursue love and wisdom? What answers lie in the recesses of my history? What meeting is there between The Dane and brute academics? The answer, as always, follows forthwith!

Academically, I am made of awesome.

I got straight As up until sixth grade. In junior high, I realized that As were distinctly not cool so I conspired to get Cs and Bs (this was, one may recall, when I picked up my interest in reading comics). This continued through early high school. By late high school, I stopped caring about cool—but woe unto my teachers, I was also bored unto distraction by what was being taught. It may have been different had I remained in accelerated learning programs, but having purposefully decelerated my academics years prior, I had been shuffled into regular old celerated classes.

AKA: Teenage babysitting.

I graduated high school with little fanfare and less interest in continued education. At least in a formal setting. I don't really know exactly what happened next. I had an on-again/off-again relationship with the local community college circuit (which I hear is a far better institutionalization than the community college set-up in other parts of the country). Going to a four-year was never really in the cards for me. I did not come from a family of wealth and nobility (we only had nobility) and I had water-boarded any chance for a good scholarship through my repeated torture of my GPA throughout high school. So, I did community college while working full time at various occupations.

I still don't know what grades I got for most of my classes as I was only there to learn. I had always taken (and largely still take) a dim view of grades. From what I gather, the courses I finished, I did well in. And the rest I either got Withdrwals, Incompletes, or Fs—I was pretty regular about discontinuing course without notice if either life got busy or if the course stopped interesting me. I pretty much kept this up for about ten years, 'til the point where life just became too frequently busy that signing up for a course would have just meant lying to myself.

The community college thing was worthwhile in its way. The average classes did me little good. English, history, civics, psychology, et cetera were all pretty rudimentary and not really worth the time, but off-the-beaten path courses were where the community college circuit began to shine. Courses in areas of study that I might otherwise have missed were awesome. Mexican History, Environmental Geology, Symbolic Logic, Film as Literature. Awesome stuff. And then, there was the eight-week course, Beginning Web Design for Businesses, which launched my web-design career (nearly a decade-strong now) and comprises the entirety of my formal computer education.

As far as continued education goes, right out of high school I visited Calvary Chapel Bible School (ring by Spring or your money back!), looking to join a school that was lauded by everyone in my church surroundings (I was, of course, waist-deep in Calvary Chapel at this point). My visit and subsequent appraisals of the quality of education available through the institution fortunately disillused me of the idea. I found the dearth of academic rigour in the place to be repulsive. Though I didn't care about grades, the real and hearty lack of education at the educational institution was astonishing. I would certainly learn nothing there.

I also toyed with the idea of transferring at some point to UCI (University of California Irvine) for a Lit or Philosophy degree, but on top of coming to the conclusion that Philosophy would suck to study (seeing as how philosopher are the second worst writer/communicators on the planet, only being superseded by lawyers), I recognized that much of my prior education would not count—or that if it did count, it would not count in any way that would actually benefit me. As well, I thought of going to Westminster Seminary California, but that would have just been for kicks rather than for any career-oriented anything.

That was all years ago now. These days, I've largely given up on getting a formal education but some of the things I'd like to do in the future would likely be helped by a formally recognized degree.

I'd like to teach Graphic Novel Lit at a college level, which would either require a real education or some kind of special dispensation (not necessarily unheard of for experts in a field). Unfortunately, at this point, that would probably mean starting from Zero, since I don't have a Bachelor's. Further complicating things, the idea of sitting through English 101 or Intro Psych would kill me. I have an incredibly difficult time paying attention to monologue when the subject interests me (a la church or a great book on tape); put me in a setting like that when I'm not interested and I might very well perish. I may go back to school for it anyway, but that would be a big undertaking, lowering myself to that level.

I've also contemplated going to art school. My figure-drawing could use some brushing up, I've never properly learnt to paint (though I am studying Chinese brush painting now), and it would be nice to be reintroduced to the latest tools of the trade. Plus, I wouldn't mind some courses in 3D software and animation. The trouble there is that a good art school is far more expensive than a good university. I was looking at a decent three-year program and I think the price-tag was around $95K. And that doesn't likely include material costs.

So, long story short: though pretty well-educated, I have little that anyone would consider a formal education. I like to read and I like to learn, but I find the formal system pretty dulling—it only fosters learning in a certain kind of person. I have a pretty high IQ (higher than the average smart person), but I have inabilities that tend to even the playing field a bit (lack of attention-span and discipline being my chief two obstacles). And while I do enjoy the idea of reading, most of my learning takes place in the wholly abstracted space between my ears as I simply ruminate. I don't have a great memory and so most of my arguments and thoughts tend to be spur-of-the-moment, off-the-cuff things rather than regurgitations of things I had learned before.

So yeah. I'm self-taught, as much as one can be self-taught.

I'm stoked, though, that the Monk is very-well educated and that she has continued her formal education as far as she has (and perhaps farther in the future). Her conventional learning and specific genius for excelling within a formal system combust well with my own internal system and more creative expression of education. Plus the breadth of her education is a useful tool as well. Our conversations, then, are wide-ranging, vigourous, and may do more to foster our mutual education than either of our learning styles on their own.

20080312

I've been thinking about what, if anything, I should write about the passing of Gary Gygax. The man had, perhaps, a greater affect on gaming than any single individual before him. Co-creating Dungeons & Dragons with Dave Arneson, Gygax forged a path that would branch far enough to capture the game-playing attentions of hundreds of millions worldwide.

Gygax's influence was not just felt by those who would participate in the '70s/'80s hobby of fantasy role-playing games, but would spread to infect game-players of many varieties. Everyone who ever played Magic: The Gathering, Pokémon, or Yu-Gi-Oh! owes that experience to Gygax. Everyone who has enjoyed Final Fantasy IV or VII, Ultima, or probably even Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has done so because Gygax pioneered the system. Oh, and every last citizen of Azeroth* owes their flying mount and countless hours grinding to one Gary F. Gygax.**

Now this is probably obvious, but I did indeed play Dungeons & Dragons. Introduced to the game as a fourth grader (this was 1984), I found it interesting though a bit confusing. I think the GM (game moderator) was trying to kill me. In sixth grade, some friends got the game and I got my own set and we set about playing a couple campaigns. These were all nighters and I had a blast. All told, I think I played the game maybe six times.

Then, the D&D = teh 3vil shtick started circulating the church circuit. Fueled by urban myths of suicides, possessions, and the summoning of spirits, Christian parents were horrified by what they had unknowingly let loose under their roofs. Larry Taylor, Bill Gothard, Jack Chick himself. Everyone was getting into the game of bashing D&D. There were books and articles and BADD (Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons). It was probably just a matter of time before the lies started sounding legit.

My mom, after reading up on the available resources, decided that she didn't really want the game in the house, so she bought me D&D materials back from me (I kept my Monster Manual because it was essential just an encyclopedia mythica and my dice because they were rad), giving me enough money to purchase a SEGA Master System (on which I played Phantasy Star, a sci-fi/fantasy role playing game***). I wasn't happy to give up my toys, but money greased the wheels and I ended up okay with it—though I never respected the lies that she had been sold. Still, how was she to know? It's not like I expected her to learn the rules and then play the game with us. It was common schoolyard thugs and bullies like Gothard and Chick that rained on parades.

These are the same people who harp on the evils of Pokémon, Harry Potter, and Mass Effect. If they don't have some hot button to mash, some controversy to invent, they lose limelight. And if they lose limelight, they lose money. And if they lose money, they might have to get a job. And work sucks, so really, who could blame them?

Well, I suppose I could. In reading some of the touching webcomic tributes to Gygax's legacy, I ran across Penny Arcade's Tycho reminiscing about what occured when his mother took away his own D&D:

The first time I ever played Dungeons & Dragons, I was six years old - books with great red demons on the cover that dared us to claim their riches, subtitled by this alien name Gygax. My mother was furious when she found my uncles had exposed me to those subterranean burrows, spilling over with rubies, and tourmalines, and the wealth of old kings even songs no longer remember. As a young man, I began hiding the books I bought inside my bed, which had a vast hollow space I had hidden in as a child. These books were soon discovered, and blamed for everything from recent colds to the dissolution of my parents' marriage. I took the wrong lesson, I'm afraid: I didn't learn to fear them. What I learned was that books, some books, were swollen with power - and this power projected into the physical realm. Some books contain the machinery required to create and sustain universes.

Whether Tycho's recollection is faithful or embellished (he does excel in embellishment), the thing is: wrong lessons can be learned. He may have learned that some books were swollen with arcane power. I learned that certain leaders in the church were liars. Not just in error. Not just mistaken. But liars. Dirty-dog liars. I'm not sure which lesson was less in line with the parental concern.

And the lesson I learned is doubtless the same lesson many kids came away with after having read Harry Potter and realized that despite loud protests to the contrary, the books were harmless. Or maybe they came away with Tycho's conclusion. In any case, good job bullies.

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NOTES:

* World of Warcraft boasts over ten million players to its name. That, in layman's terms, is a lot.

** No, that's not really his name.

*** Granted, role playing games on computers are barely role-playing at all.

20080311

Just three recent book adventures today.

• Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky
• Chip Kidd: Book One: Work: 1986–2006 by Chip Kidd et al
• The New Well-Tempered Sentence by Karen Elizabeth Gordon

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Book: Novel
Author: Irène Némirovsky
Year: 1942/2007
Pages: 448.

Some background. Némirovsky was a Ukranian Jew who had been living in France for twenty years. She was a celebrated author (so says the copy). Once Germany invaded France, lived in the countryside until, in July 1942, she was sent to Auschwitz, where she eventually died in the infirmary. She was only able to complete the first two movements of her five-book suite. Those two books make up the bulk of Suite Française.

Recognizing beforehand that this wouldn't be a complete story arc,* I had to try to approach the book without any prejudice toward it for having a weak ending (i.e., no ending). Unfinished books can be interesting to read to view the storytelling process in the midst of its evolution, but are rarely satisfying as stories in their own right. Némirovsky's work here is perhaps more polished than a simple draft, but even her notes suggest that the finished chapters and two volumes that were published are not necessarily how they would appear in her final product.

So then, what about what we are given?

It's, well, pretty good. It's not riveting by any means. There is no climax to her first act ("Storm in June") and her second act plays out pretty softly (appropriately enough for a section entitled "Dolce"). While each segment picks up interest in later chapters, both start off at such a slowburn that many readers won't make it past a hundred pages. Character-wise, Némirovsky doesn't provide the reader with many sympathetic characters either. Not only are almost all the inhabitants of her story arrogant hypocrites, but they are almost universally uninteresting as well.

The first book is a pile of vignettes describing the circumstances of several families and individuals as they flee Paris on the eve of its fall into German hands on 14 June 1940. The narrative is as disorganized and haphazard, perhaps, as was the exodus it chronicles. There are flourishes of course and moments of interest (notably a chapter written from the perspective of a cat in heat), but on the whole it functions better as documentary than as story. The second book is easily superior, but much slower paced. There are more sympathetic characters and much more time for introspection. In a way, book two ("Dolce") could function as some sort of Jane Austen work, only with Nazis and crap.

Back to characters. Reading, Suite Française, I first thought that Némirovsky was an out-and-out misanthrope, despising all humanity, no matter its form or station. Gradually, I came to see that there is a certain class of person whom Némirovsky bears little ill will and seems to believe at least capable of being both genuine and rational. Those people seem to fit in the lower middle class and be young enough to still see beauty in the world (the Michaud couple are only in their early forties or so, and are an exception to the youthfulness qualification). Her sympathetic characters are the Michauds, Jean-Marie Michaud, Lucile, the young engaged couple fleeing from Paris on their wedding day, Bruno (the German soldier staying with Lucille's family), Madeleine (to some extent), and Hubert (after he rejects the hypocrisy and privilege of his class).

I should note I really did appreciate Némirovsky's ability to describe the hypocrisies of her characters through the various perspectives of her other characters. This actually makes it a little more difficult to pin down the author's own feelings toward others.

I'd be curious to read Némirovsky's other works to see how she paints the classes as a general rule, but if they're not more interesting books than Suite Française, I think I'll skip.

Rating:

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Book: Art Collection
Author: Chip Kidd et al
Year: 2005
Pages: 400.

After I picked up Suite Française, I happened to look at the cover-design credit and recognized the name Chip Kidd. After a moment's reflection as to the source of my familiarity with the designer, I walked over to my bookshelf and picked up a volume from my collection of Osamu Tezuka's Buddha. Sure enough, Kidd had designed the covers for the entire series (incidentally, I found the design one part frustrating and one part inspiring, as the spines line up nicely and thematically but the half-jacket is kind of obnoxious to deal with).

After that, I went through my shelves and picked out any of the books that I thought had interesting covers. At least half of those were designed by Kidd as well. Kafka on the Shore. Pagan Babies. The Enigma of Japanese Power. Created in Darkness by Troubled Americans. Et cetera.

I was intrigued, Googled our dear designer, and found that he was more popular than I had properly imagined. This piqued still further my curiosity. And so now I have another book with a cover designed by Kidd: Chip Kidd: Book One: Work: 1986-2006, a 400-page volume exhibiting a sample of his book-jacket designwork from the last twenty years.

The book itself is a treasure. A visual smorgasbord of styles and themes. A veritable cornucopia of novel treatments. While there is an occasional overlap of feel or technique (or some other abstract quantification equally obscured and subjective), the breadth of design direction is truly impressive.

Kidd is clearly a creative devil.

And this collection of his work is impressively presented. Book One is a treat for both the eyes and the mind. While a mere presentation of the jacket designs themselves would be a worthwhile scheme for a design collection such as this, the work is elevated by helpful descriptions both of product and process by the creator himself as well as reactions penned by authors/victims of his creative process. Kidd's text shows both a joy in his work and a look into what goes into the crafting of a book jacket that enlarges upon the work it contains—and does so with humour and more apparent humility than I would have expected.

I found the book so interesting that I blew through the entire thing in two days. Doubtlessly, I'll return to it time and again over the coming months and years. In any case, I highly recommend it to those interested in thoughtful design, a pairing of words too rare in our day.

note: a big bone of contention is not the visual design of the volume's cover but its physical properties. While its dimensions are perfectly suitable for an art collection/coffee table read, the unique composition of its cover can be difficult to negotiate. The hardback cover only extends (front and back) to the point of the spine of the book photographed on the cover. Inside the hardback cover is a paperback cover that extends to house the rest of the book. It is awkward, certainly, and took a bit of getting used to, but once I became accustomed to the book, holding it comfortably ceased to be a difficulty. Heh, a book with a physical learning curve—that was a new one for me.

Rating:

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Book: Grammar Aid
Author: Karen Elizabeth Gordon
Year: 2003
Pages: 147.

I am not by any means a grammar-Nazi.

I do enjoy the use of language in ways that convey meaning and intent both clearly and beautifully, but I'm not gonna make a big deal when someone uses a hyphen instead of an en dash when they say they work 8–5. I just can't see getting upset about something like that. I may pick on poor word-choice occasionally and come off more prescriptivist when it comes to vocabulary—but that's really just when it suits my needs.

Still, as a not-small portion of my job includes writing copy for the public and editing copy from others, it does indeed pay to know what's what. Especially where punctuation is concerned.

The New Well-Tempered Sentence is as close to being what I want in a book on punctuation. Easily discernible chapters, each exposing the numerous usage tics of the punctuative mark in question. Very brief descriptions of rules of usage followed by several lively examples. And funny illustrations (presumably pilfered from antiquarian sources). At 140-some pages, the book is lean and functional and makes it easy when I forget where the spaces go when ellipsizing. I could have probably used rules and examples for some of the more complex constructions I'm either handed or have a hand myself in constructing—but then the book wouldn't likely be 140-some pages and I don't think I could abide a 150-page version.

While the book rates high by me for its simplicity and brevity, one of the selling points is the scrumptious prose examples used to delineate usage. Here are a couple examples from the chapter on the Hyphen:

✽ A hyphen expresses hesitation or stuttering.

"I'm d-d-delighted to see you again," she stammered, barring his way into the room with her big toe spread out to its full size.

✽ A hyphen indicates the spelling out of words.

"You are my darling, my d-a-r-l-i-n-g," said the spelling master to his rapt and evasive pupil as he opened her eyes to a whole new lexicon of shame.

In any case, if you already have a book on punctuation then you are probably fine without Karen Elizabeth Gordon's; however, if you are in need, The New Well-Tempered Sentence will almost certainly fill that need. It may even delightfully expand the pages to your lexicon of shame.

Rating:

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20080310

More in the art department: I put together a compilation CD for a guy I know who was interested in hearing the Decemberists. I didn't want to just give him the whole album (thereby stemming his need to purchase the album if he liked it), so I put on a selection of four songs from the Decemberists as well as four songs each from three other bands. Of course, unable to simply just toss him a silver Memorex CD-R alone, I added some album art. Behold! His new rock sound. It will explode his faces off.

20080305

So let's be clear from the start. This is only theory. It may even approach operational theory for me, but it is only my best guess as to the way things may be. So then...

I don't believe in homosexuality, bisexuality, or heterosexuality. Well, not in any such way as they should be considered rigid descriptions of the way people are. Instead, I believe in sexuality.

It seems to me that people are not one thing or another. It is not a matter of gay vs. straight. People are sexual by nature and that sexuality will pour, burst, or drain out in any number of ways. Sometimes a man will ache for a woman, sometimes for a man, sometimes for a sheepdog, and sometimes for an awesome, awesome shoe.

I'm not saying that one's preferences will alter willy-nilly with the turbulence and unpredictability of a sweaty stick of dynamite. What I am saying is that people aren't as static as they may prefer to think.

No, I think that while one may be born with certain tastes intact (as I was born with an instinctive distaste for most vegetables), much of our choice of sexual expression is taste acquired—acquired by any number of those ten thousand environmental and circumstantial variables that shape who we are and who we will come to be. If the rise and apparent popularity of bisexuality were not enough to prompt a different understanding of homosexuality vs. heterosexuality, then even a cursory glance at the sexual life of prison society ought to be. Homosexual activity in prisons is common to the point of stereotype in men who in mixed-sex environments choose heterosexual partnerships. The reason is not that such men are closeted homosexuals but simply that they are sexual at all, and desire release for that particular appetite. Further extrapolation might even demonstrate that every heterosexually-oriented kid who ever masturbated was in that moment engaged in a sort of bisexual sexual expression—homosexual in physicality and heterosexual in mentality.

Orientation is, I think, a tricky word so long as we presume it to mean something unwavering and unalterable. But so long as we imagine it to mean nothing more than one's vector in a given moment, I think it becomes a worthwhile term. Despite self-perpetuated rumours to the contrary, my current orientation (and, really, lifelong) is toward a common heterosexual partnerships. Do I believe that it is possible that thirty years from now I could be differently oriented? Of course I do.

That doesn't, however, mean such a change is likely. After all, my formative years are long behind me. I imagine it would take, at this point, some sort of extreme environmental or circumstantial catalyst to redirect my sexuality toward other men, children, animals, or objects. Not that it couldn't happen, but the impetus for change would probably have to be a stronger one than it would when I was six or sixteen.

So yeah, theory. I think it's viable and I think it tends toward promoting both understanding and tolerance, placing all humanity in the same boat sexually. Other people might pursue sexual expressions that are more harmfully either to themselves or to society (e.g., child molestation), but this doesn't mean that they are so different than us and it doesn't mean that we shouldn't be able to empathize.

20080304

A lifetime project to which I occasionally return is the conversion of all my dvds (somewhat over 400) to thinpaks. A thinpak dvd case is roughly half the depth of a standard dvd case. And so, math majors can affirm, will take up roughly half the shelf space. As shelf space is currently at a premium in the house (being more necessary and coveted than gasoline at this point), I thought it prudent to revist the old project.

On a lark, I thought I'd invest time in the music video/concert aspect of my collection. On a further lark, I thought it might look cool if all my music dvds looked like they were a part of the same series, no matter their publisher. Here's the concept as it's currently shaping up:

Heh, the wave motion on that second Harry Connick Jr. disc, made by the white of his undershirt, makes that cover look like a Coke product.