Apparently, they're all 'up and backs', but at least I am on the road!  

Today?  Ackworth!  Because Dolemite wants his money! 

Tomorrow?  Back to Highlands to install a sound board and keep working toward make connections.

Wednesday?  Griffin!  Exciting Griffin!  Can't wait to go to ... Griffin!  yea.

Thursday!  Cleveland!  And not even Cleveland ohio, nope... Cleveland Georgia! 

Monday?  Gainesville Woo hoo! 

SO, the travel may not be exciting, but travel means work and work means money and money means food and food means I live to fight another day. 

Badda Bing, y'all.

So you're planning an event and you need some help. 

Customers ought to know the 'rule of two':  Good, Fast, Cheap... you can choose any two.  If it's good and fast, it won't be cheap...etc.

As a service provider for various projects, I have a variation:  Fun, Easy, Cheap.  If it's not fun & not easy, it's not going to be cheap.  BTW, this is fun for ME, not you.  If it's not easy & cheap, it had better well be fun.  If you're cheap and it's not fun, it better be very easy. 

Learn, love, live.

So, for those of you interested, there is another 'Tea Party' on July 4 from 5 to 9 at the Capitol.

I am working it.  This is odd for me because, I suspect that I'll disagree with a lot of what I hear. 

However, when someone is your client (even if you're working for next to nothing) you have to take their ideas seriously. 

Frankly, There's a lot for me to dissent from.  I do not think it's a crime to require taxes, income or other wise.  I think requiring their payment is legal.  I will stipulate that our tax system, ultimately, is involuntary.  However, we directly elect our members of the U.S. of Representatives, where all tax bills must begin. 

I believe the 16th amendment to the Constitution is legitimate and if people REALLY hate the income tax, they'll repeal that amendment.  We've done it before. 

There has been a general belief among the people throwing this affair that what these rallies are about is 'Freedom'.  As has been discussed here before, the linguistics come into play.  When people mention freedom, what they most often mean is 'Freedom from' and in this case, it seems the primary freedom with which they're concerned is the freedom from paying taxes,

What I have heard less about is 'liberty' which in the modern context is more often identified with what a person can do with no one stopping them.  E.G. "I am at liberty to breastfeed where ever I wish"   These events seem to be more about 'freedom from' than 'liberty to'.

The thread that seems to unite all the disparate groups sponsoring the event is a hatred of the Fed, which is odd, since the Fed is not owned by the government.  It's stockholders are the national banks.  It's a heavily regulated private corporation.  

If privatization is the goal and having the government do less is the goal, is not the Fed the shining star upon the hill?  Surely without it, we'd be in worse financial shape after all the banking collapses.  

I agree with these folks that deficits are bad and that debt, long term, is worse, but that's where we part company,  I generally cannot get any of the smaller government people to answer the following:  What program from which you and those who agree with you uniquely benefit and that those who disagree with you don't benefit are you willing to cut?

It will be interesting to measure the atmosphere tomorrow.  Hopefully not anti-emetic or too demogogish either...

Sembler wants Dekalb county to finance the completion of its latest mega project.   Generally, I am not a Sembler fan, but there could be a big silver lining here, in fact you could say, it's putting the cart before the horse.

You see, the long term benefit here isn't more taxes, or more housing, or even another branch of Nuevo Lorado, rather, its the chance to build a MARTA station.

Right now, it's a long way between the Brookhaven and Chamblee MARTA stations.  Oglethorpe University is not easy walking distance.  

Adding the Sembler project risks adding a ton of traffic to Peachtree rd.  However, if part of funding the Sembler project also included adding a MARTA station, the whole thing might just come together.

Sembler's 'Town' project is about a block and a half south of Oglethorpe.  MARTA stations tend to be about a block long.  Positioned correctly, both Oglethorpe's Campus and Sembler would be well served.  The result would be an ecologically sound economic boomlet!

Oglethorpe is an under-utilized resource and, like Emory, it has never been as integrated into city life as it could.  Add a MARTA station and suddenly a lot more people can get to the Georgia Shakespeare festival.  A lot more can come to exhibits at the Oglethorpe Museum, and far fewer students would need a car, easing a problem Oglethorpe has long had.

Sembler too would see both the value of its project go up and would see substantial traffic mitigation.  The number of customers who could reach the project wouls sky rocket, as would the number who would want to live there with the train easy walking distance away.

The metro area would win as they would have easier access to cultural and educational amenities.  Dekalb county would win because property values would go up even as traffic per resident was lessened, and locals would benefit as well.

The question is whether any of the political parties here are horses that can be lead.

According to a recent op art published in the New York Times, it's people in the Red States who have no idea how to handle the intimate lives.

Their divorce rates, teen-age pregnancy rates, and porn subscription rates are higher than their blue counterparts.  On its face, this is counter-intuitive, but with a little thought, it's easy to understand why...

People in the Red States don't talk about sex and intimacy much & when they do, it is often to condemn the practices of others, rather than try to honestly express their own wants and desires.

In the south, I have witnessed countless occasions in which young people are told they can't be sexual or intimate.  What do you think they are driven to do?  Tell someone they can't and they want to.  Talk with them about it regularly and ask and then they're empowered and make better choices.

This comes in the face of South Carolina Governor Sanford's recent troubles and those of other Senators.  I know conservatives are shocked by this, but lots of people have sex and enjoy it!  They think it's fun. 

Moreover, age alone is not a determinant factor in how responsible a person is in using their own body.  I know a 16 year old who likely is ready to make her own sexual decisions.  She's ready to decide if, when, how, and with whom she'll use her body.  Conversely, I know a guy in his thirties who just isn't ready yet.  Honestly, I don't think he has his head around what it means and what it doesn't to be sexual.   

I know all kinds of people in between.  There are rarely cases where I think it's any of my business to say 'NO, You Can't do that!", and most of those not only involve stopping a person from sex, but also taking their car keys for other reasons.

It's far better to talk with people are say, "hey!  Do you know what you're doing?"  "Have you thought about what X means?"  "What kind of person do you want to be?"  

Make people think about these issues and they generally decide for themselves to be more considerate of themselves and their potential lover, regardless of age, because they realize that sexuality is not something merely happening to them, but that they are choosing to make happen.  They get to decide how it happens and they're free to be sexual or not.  They also figure out pretty quickly that they are responsible.  

When you're being told you can't or when you think something is being imposed upon you over which you think you have no power, then you're not likely to own the consequences.  However, when you know you are making a choice and that making good choices will lead to happiness, you take that responsibility pretty seriously.  

Abstinence only education is a failure precisely for this reason.  In the work I do on HIV awareness, we see it all the time.  The difference in the attitude between kids who are brought up to think that they are sexual people and that sex will be part of their lives, but not all of their lives is radically different from the people who think that 'sex is something that happens to them'.  

The former sees an opportunity to be managed.  The second either run from themselves or go hog wild then try to pick up the pieces.

All of this to say to the Conservatives out there that the bible anticipates sex being a regular fun part of life.  It's okay to think about it, to have it, and to write about it.  It's okay to love all kinds of people in all kinds of ways and the sooner you figure this out, they happier you'll be and the more likely your kids are to make good decisions. 

Remember, when given his choices, Jesus hung out with the whores and made wine and yet somehow did not become a drunken slut. 

The road was good!  

Second Best Ice Cream in the US?  Tasty!  Atlantic Ocean?  Still there.

My road compatriots were not the party animals I expected.  They also did not buy the first round.  They will learn over time that if you're not nice to your road crew off site, your road crew will not show you love on site. 

Moreover, in Savannah, where there is a lot to do, even at night, they were NOT up for the party.  They did not want to go see container ships (and perhaps take one out for a spin), they did not want to hit Parkers, all very odd. 

Still, I had fun. 

Now, on to a weekend of Dancing Monkey Cabaret and seeing a close friend in a free Choral Concert at Spivey Hall on Saturday @ 1:30.  If you like the music of Eric Whitacre or the Faure Requiem, you should join in. 

Dancing Monkey will also be funny.  It is possible that I'll get to run sound for this sucker which would be a treat.  Even if I don't Aaron Gotlieb, Cathy Poley, Amanda Cucher, and Topher Payne are all performing.  The contrast between the 'Topherness' of it all and the other southern elements are curious, but it will be a fun evening....

Man, it's good to be back on the road.  The trips to Madison Georgia were fun and so forth, but it was all pretty stressful. 

Somehow, this is less stressful.  This is Highlands, North Carolina, where they do not need air conditioning.  I am the only person awake in the entire inn.

The Academy?  Can't do much about it tonight.  Other life in Atlanta?  Sorry, not home.  Georgia Politics?  I'm in North Carolina now! 

Different trickier politics!  Still, it's all a relief.  I hear the frogs croaking, the bears playing with the trash (not kidding, actual bears, actual trash)

Today, I install a sound system, make sure that it works, and then head home for literally, 10 hours (8 of which I should be asleep), then it's off to two shows in Savannah, and then back to town for Dancing Monkey Cabaret! 

If I am very lucky, I'll have a couple of hours to play here and comfort friends. 

I did make one choice about the Savannah trip which vaguely splits the road's rules.  The rest of my crew is driving down in a van from the home office at 9 AM.  They will then return the following morning at, you guessed it, 9 AM.

Now, I know we're supposed to be brothers in arms and all that but A) 9 AM?  You've got to be kidding me.  Both ways?  fogettaboutit!

Second, it leaves me no time to play in Savannah, and I have not been all year.  I may sleep in, but then I am going to the art galleries, the river front, to see the ocean and to eat the Second Best Ice Cream in America!  Yarr!

One of the elements of a tour about which people complain is that every city looks the same: traffic, hotel, shower, bed, back stage, audience, bad diner food, and back on the bus.  Nearly everyone I know likes the lay over day in the city where you get to take a bath and actually walk down to the corner store... and Savannah's corner store is some serious stuff.  Parker's Strawberry Lemonade is 48 hours away. 

Three states in three days:  three theatres, three shows, and one install.  Just me, my podcasts, and a Kayak ready to take on the world.  

Bless the road... and get your Dancing Monkey Cabaret Tickets.

If there is one thing Interns can do, it's remind you of just how lucky you are...

I have one intern who doesn't really have a choice.  Acting is what he's got.  Show business is what he loves and what he cares about and that's about it. 

I have another intern who is very interested in film and theater, but might be able to be happy doing something else.  He may want to be comfortable more than he wants to act.  Given the relatively low percentage of actors who earn their living simply by acting, I have recommended to him that he think seriously about what he wants to do. 

It also made me realize that I am lucky.  I work with a number of theatrical groups and I'm the artistic director for one of them.  I am helping to keep several other theater groups in health, and even sometimes get paid to do it.  

I'm not rich, I am not famous, but I am working... and now, that's saying a lot...

In one week a lot can happen...

The most important thing, of course, is that the Iranian Government stole the election from it's people.  This, short term, bodes poorly for Iran, and well for us.  Now it's Americas President that's legit and Iran's that isn't.

I need a new shirt because I lost mine on the ATLSteamfest.  Still, the art was great, the play was good, and the people who came seemed really to have enjoyed it.  We will learn and do it again next year.  I am trying to put a Brave Face on it, but the lost money will indeed be a hardship, and the world reminds you that when you win, people care, but you lose alone. 

Camp SUnshine though, mitigates that.  These kids fight far bigger battles than money every day and I appraciate them so much.  They work very hard and are very focused.  They also release well.

Now, it's time to get ready for the next influx of shows from tomorrow's trangendered marriage explorations to battleaxes to dancing monkeys.  They'll all need support and somewhere in there, the road calleth me.  

God bless the road.

Imagine if Operation Rescue bombed the Marriott Marquis (either of them) .   What would you think?  What would it tell you about the group?  What do you expect the reaction of most Americans would be?

If your answer are :"Oh no!", "THey've Lost it!" "Those jerks, we're not with them!"  Then apply that to the Taliban in Pakistan & Afghanistan. 

 Tom Lehrer, one of America's great satirists, once said "To show you how effective [national brotherhood week] is, on the first day, Malcolm X was killed... because there are people who do not love their fellow man and I HATE people like that."

There has been a lot of that running around lately.  Not just hate, but bullshit masking as hate.  It's the usual suspects, but the idea is that we need a them.  If there is a them, then there is an exclusive we. 

Obama's a Socialist, Satamayer is "too Latina" and somehow that's a problem, and in order to "preserve all human life" we have to take one. 

That's enough.  You want to disagree with a position, that's fine, but if you think the only way to get me to be sympathetic is to try to poison my mind against a group of people, then change yours! 

"We're right, but we can't prove it or make logical sense of it so we'll just hate you.", isn't good enough anymore. 

Atheists can't 'prove' there is no god.  Christians cannot prove there is without faith or that "all Muslims are evil".  It's wrong to hate people from other countries whom you've never met. 

There are exceptions of course, Ratko Mladic has my true disgust, but he's killed hundreds of thousands. 

Short of folks like that, All I am saying is give peace a chance. 

It is sad when the asymptotes of virtue leave little area in which to maneuver, but it's the case.

Right now, I am trying to save a theater; moreover, I am trying to do it the right way, and that is by making the work that goes on their worthwhile and paying the people who do it well.

Sadly, almost all three of those items are in some conflict.  In order for the theater to be worth saving, it has to provide good content.  Providing that content, however, is often expensive.  We recently co-produced a storytelling festival and barely broke even.  In variable cost terms, we lost money.  Yet, the work was actually good. 

Further, doing work that challenges people also means risking alienating your audience, and that's expensive.  It's even more expensive when you'd like each person who works on a project to make at least minimum wage.  Literally.  If an actor works for 4 hours a day at a rehearsal, usually 6 days a week, that's 24 hours.  24 x $7.25 = $174.50 per week, per actor.  Now assume 5 actors, a stage manager, and a director, all making that amount; that's $1221.50 a week.  With 4 weeks of rehearsal, that's $4886 before you even turn on the lights before the first show.

Basically, each show costs about $20,000 if your entire staff gets minimum wage for a 4 week run.  Now, the Fire Marshall says I can have 129 people in my theater.  Assume a 16 show (4 a week) run.  That means before you've paid concessions, staff, box office, water, electricity, or anything else, you have to sell every single seat just to keep ticket prices at $10.  If you want to pay everyone else, ticket prices would need to be at least $15 and perhaps $18.  Again, that presumes selling absolutely every seat. 

What it means is that the business, in some ways, is cost prohibitive.  I can't pay people even minimum wage to do the work, or I have to limit myself to tiny shows, or I have to do crap. 

How does crap make it cheaper?  I can get inferior actors to work for less.  So too with designers.  I can rent the place to do companies that use volunteers and produce inferior work, but they too often lose money. 

Basically, to rescue this place, I have to cut costs, find donors, and rent it out, all to fund shows that themselves will have to sell out to keep the place from merely standing still. 

It can be done.  It's just going to take a while... and some luck... and a big pot of money.  Have one?

Newspapers seem to have entered the digital 'Very Silly' Zone!

Rather than focusing on producing first rate journalism that no one else could even attempt to replicate, they've cut staff and declared they'll be more on line than ever!

They then freak out when the revenue model doesn't hold up, not realizing of course, that the problem is that they've let their best writers go and so fewer people are reading than ever.   

Enter Steve Brill, who thinks they ought to charge for content.  He's wrong of course, water does not flow up hill and with good free substitutes around, few people will pay for material that lacks its former quality. 

Worse, however, is the advertorial creep.  The Atlanta Journal Constitution now requires all folks who want to list events with them to fill out an on line form.  However, as the form progresses, the writer is reminded repeatedly that for $49.95, their piece will be more prominently placed, have more photos, and, it is implied, more coverage. 

This violates what should be the second highest wall in American life... the separation of the editorial and publishing side of journalism.  Never should they meet. 

If you can buy journalistic coverage, it isn't objective anymore.  Further, it's fraud, because it purports to be objective.  The paper itself is still breaking stories and publishing, but somewhere Bill Kovach weeps.  For rather than being the New York Times of the South, the AJC seems headed to be Middle Georgia's pale impersonator of USA Today.  Couldn't they have sucked it up and just become a poor substitute for porn?

Murder is generally a bad solution to most problems, but in the case of killing Dr. George Tiller, it's going to backfire. 

Recent polling show Americans slightly more pro-life than pro-choice for the first time in years.  Killing Tiller will change that.  It will also guarantee that Sonia Sotomayor will face no tough questioning in regard to abortion before the Senate.  In fact, this killing likely will make her confirmation even more likely. 

Fortunately, most anti-abortion groups have condemned this killing.  This is a departure from Randall Terry who  relishes the death of other doctors who provided abortions.  Clearly they have gotten the message that such behavior does not help their cause.

People can disagree about abortion and the ethical asymptotes which ought apply, but there are some basic on which reasonable people can agree.  No one is going out and saying 'Hey!  Let's get preggers so we can go get an abortion!  That'd be the bomb!"  No one is doing this. 

Nor have a majority of anti abortion medical professionals I've chatted with been able to condemn the Tay Sachs case.  It's just different. 

The killer, alleged to be Scott Roeder, clearly does not even want to listen.  He clearly does not understand that in killing this doctor, the total death count will increase. 

I hope that the prosecutor is smart enough to not seek the Death Penalty as the irony would be palpable.  Let the guy plead out to first degree, get him some psychiatric care and let him rot. 

AN Eye for an Eye leaves the whole world blind.  I hope that Dr. Tiller's family can find some solice.  I hope that someone shows them compassion.  So too the other members of the Parish where the doctor was shot.

Barack Obama, a weepy nation turns it's lonely eyes to you.

I appreciate that people enjoy their computing time.  I do, however, I believe that every 30 minutes or so, it would be healthy for this page to put up...

I have noticed that there are people who are losing their souls to on line RPGs, "social networking sites", and other forms of malicious mental spywear.  The funny thing is that in some cases, they don't even attempt to deny it.  One television site proclaims that they are trying to turn your mind into mush. 

That we as a species fall prey to this is just pathetic!  Go out!  Meet actual people!

Marketers tell us that in order to keep up, let alone break through, in the new media, one must have a Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, and heaven knows what else. 

So at my workplace there is a common Facebook account.  I am the user 90% of the time, but not 100, but still I have decided to experiment.

I updated my status as 'E4'.  Now, this is a gambit within a gambit.  The question is whether anyone will take it.   

I think it will measure a couple of things... First, whether people pay attention to what other people actually write on facebook and second whether they think about it at all.

Numerous accounts have now been written of plays translated into facebook stati, but so far there has been very little actual activity documented with facebook stati alone.  If this gambit is picked up, an actual drama will unfold in a unique language that people from many countries can understand and observe.  Further, because language, by it's very nature is an abstraction, and the drama will be an abstraction, it will take a certain amount of mental energy to follow along.

Which is precisely why I doubt anyone will do it.

I am appalled by the facts laid out in an article in the Sunday Times Magazine.  It tells of Montgomery County, Georgia and the fact that Black students are not welcome at the prom put together by the White Parents.  It shows us that racial bigotry against African Americans still simmers and stews and White folks are still taking bites of it where they can.  It is dreadfully sad.

One student in the article sums it up clearly, "“My best friend is white,” said one senior girl, a little glumly. “She’s in there. She’s real cool, but I don’t understand. If they can be in there, why can’t everybody else?”

The article points out that several white & black students would like to have a unified prom but, “But it’s the white parents who say no. … They’re like, if you’re going with the black people, I’m not going to pay for it.”

Have we learned nothing?  Have we not learned that there is a difference between having discriminating taste and tasting discrimination? 

The school board (majority white) will not officially sanction a prom, so no school funds are at risk here from a Federal Civil Rights claim, but the influence of the white leaders is obvious.  From their point of view, race matters. 

White students attribute this to tradition, but following a tradition for its own sake when a clearly better alternative exists is pure folly. 

In the 1930s, basketball was a sport dominated by Jewish Players.  Christians were even discouraged from playing.  It was a traditionally Jewish sport until the late 1950s.  Can you imagine trying to convince a group of young Christians that they shouldn't play basketball with Jewish players because it's a traditionally Jewish game?  I did not think so.  Why?  Because the tradition in no way makes the event better!  In fact it makes it worse.  So too in Montgomery County. 

Creed matters not in the Big Dance and it shouldn't matter at the prom either. 

I know four couples who are about to have kids.  It's conceivable (not to put too fine a pun on it) that they'll all go into labor the same day. 

This leads to a funny thought...  What if they all arrived at the same hospital, same wing, etc...  you get the picture.

The play is the thing!  Now, having thought of the comic possibilities, I am awfully temped to write it.

In the real world, I know all the mothers and in two cases am closer to them than the fathers.  In one case, I am much closer to the father.  In one case I am equally close.

However, the women here have actual work to do and drugs to take, leaving the nervous Mamet like banter to the men. 

The Play will have to be called 'You Did This To Me!' and of course, all the women are strong and all the babies above average.  It's the going through the delivery of a fatherhood mindset that could provide excellent fodder indeed. 

Characters:  MIchael, a Capunkatalist
Theo: An Attorney
Brian: A Husband
Joshua:  A Nick Horbyesque Musicological father
DOctors, Nurses, Orderlies, Parents, and animatronic babies

Scene Opens outside a Maternity Suite
Joshua: Fuck Fuck Fuck Fuck Fuck Fuck, hey, you sure I can't smoke here? (pulls out cigarette)
Male Nurse:  Sir Dude!  Relax man, it's going to be okay.
MIchael: Where's fucking suite 204?  I went to park the car and now I'm all turned around.  Fuck.  
Male Nurse:  This is 402.  204 is on the other side of the foyer.
Michael:  Thanks, wait, fuck, wait, you mean it's not two floors down? 
Male Nurse:  No, each wing of suites is it's own number
Michael:  That's just weird (turns to go, then back)
Michael: Wait, Joshua? 
Joshua is about to light his cigarette using a strike anywhere match with "911" written down the stem

And it would go on from there....
God it's tempting to write....

Print & Independent Journalistic outlets are becoming harder to find, but they're vital.  Most have been supported with advertisements. 

Newspapers are vanishing like crazy.  The Christian Science Monitor has become an on-line publication only.  Increasingly, we need to directly support those publications that are not the Evil That Is Advertorial. 

Now, one of the last remaining independent and important music magazines is at risk, and if you're from Georgia, this is especially important, because its published out of Decatur!.

PASTE magazine is in trouble, and needs your help.  Advertisers have vanished.  The music business is changing and while PASTE seemed poised to whether the storm, they've hit a cash crunch.  

You need to help them.  Yes.  You.  I have.  I chose to donate.  In return, they've put up loads of rare MP3 tracks from everyone from She & Him to Bob Mould; from Ben Folds to Betty Lavette!  Anything will help.

In a time when the difference between the access to finding less popular and better crafted music is having folks who can critically assess it (trust me, there are more than 65,000 new music downloads added to youtube and other sources daily, you can't keep up) is vitally important.  Further, it's good to have those people in different regions of the country.  I really admire Jon Pareles, but he's in New York, writing for New Yorkers.  PASTE is here, writing for a national audience, but with an eye on their back yard.  

Won't YOU chip in?  It's important folks. 

 She walked up to me at the cast party.  She was an art dealer which meant she had good eyes, I mean really nice eyes.  Really nice.  

I said hello and tried to keep my composure, but she knew how to play me, see?  She could play me like Yankee plays second base, which means she stomped on me alot and rubbed her legs on me and I liked it.

She had a job for me, and what could I do, I was on top of the diamond, but stuck at second base, and you can't go home again.  

See, there was this guy who was supposed to do this thing for this dame and now he was gone and he probably took the book with him.  She wanted me to find him and if possible to get the book back.  I was going to take another sip of wine when she belted me with scotch.  At least it was a blend.  She's have hit me with single malt and I'd be in the gutter right now, completely 'dalmoralized'.

Still now I had to find this flower, this rose of a guy.  He might be hiding in the mountains or hiding in town.  Kid, his name might be mud there, but they wanted the book, see?  And they wanted to know why.  And why was my specialty.  She knew I was a guy who did a thing and if I found the guy and found out why, what a thing the whole town might do to me.  Allegedly.  Cause in that town, All the women are strong, All the men are drinkers, and all the bears are above average.

And it's all true, give or take a lie or two...