Cameron Maddux

The Odyssey on Angel Island by the We Players

2012-01-03T09:03:00.000-08:00

Support the We Players production of The Odyssey on Angel Island to get an early ping when tickets go on sale.

In 2010, I wrote about how I thought the We Players production of Hamlet was the best production of Shakespeare I've ever experienced (experience is a key word in We Players.) I even explained why, so you didn't think it was my normal hyperbole. I mean look at Sam's face in this pic - he is captivated!

And stage lighting provided by the sun. This scene is the delivery of the "Denmark's a prison" exchange and it is set at Alcatraz! Brilliant.

Well they are at it again.They are going to do The Odyssey on Angel Island. And I can't freaking wait. If you are in the Bay Area, please support it - you will not regret it. What scene will happen here?

Sam, the Archer

2011-12-31T09:12:00.001-08:00

Nothing like watching your kid live the dream, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

Sam bought a bow yesterday. Let the arrows fly.

Attention

2011-12-17T09:07:00.000-08:00

This scene is one of two of my favorites from The Social Network. I love this part not (only) for the reason that it probably gets so much recognition. Yes, it is the moment where the nerd basically says "Fuck you" to the privileged jocks - and Jesse Eisenberg absolutely owns these lines - and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross somehow play the exact sounds going on in your head during the tension-filled moment. So yes all that movie/narrative magic is awesome and deeply appeals to my emotions, but intellectually I strongly believe in the words:

You have part of my attention - you have the minimum amount. The rest of my attention is back at the offices of Facebook, where my colleagues and I are doing things that no one in this room, including and especially your clients, are intellectually or creatively capable of doing.

We place so much emphasis on "full attention." I've been reading a bit of Cathy N Davidson's wonderful book Now You See It, about attention. I have yet to immerse myself in it (to the point of this post) but it is on my list of hopeful contenders for my time this holiday break. One of the driving ideas in the book is that attention is much more complex and diverse than we often think about it or how it is perceived culturally, as well as linguistically.

You and I don't have the same type of attention. Also, the rate of attention disorders will continue to increase, not because of chemical/genetic problems, not because of behavioral problems, but because of large societal institutions failure to adapt to 21st century realities. Chief among these problems being the classrooms which then feeds into the workplace. My guess is that we are living in the only time when a majority of classrooms and workplaces are ill-equipped for the future of individual, business and societal needs. And the failure to recognize how attention works and build appropriate systems for it is one of major reasons why. (By the way, I teach so I am knocking myself in this post.)

If you have read Clay Shirky's incredible book Cognitive Surplus, then you know the attitude of How dare you? many of us feel towards the single-focus time-suck of television, which lulled us into an inappropriate single focus (much of which I devoted to Three's Company in my youth.) Furthermore, we are celebrating that today's technology is unraveling that insufficiency significantly.

Two of the primary tools of the wildfire spreading of Internet content are email and the web browser. Both of these things hit revolution points with relative "tack-ons." Reply-All for e-mail (while still shockingly incorrectly used by many - Oh, Aunt Tina and Mike at work) was an add-on. Who knew people would be able to have complex group conversations with intricate dynamics? I don't know much about the actual development of tabbed interface, but I do remember what it was like building stuff for the web pre-2000. We were obsessed with slow-speed (Client: Can I put a small, 15-second video on my website? Us: Laughter. Can you fit an elephant up your ass? Client: Well, that's unprofessional.) I'm guessing much of the thought for browser tabs revolved around being able to do x while y was loading. Remember when waiting for something to load was 85% of time online? Now, browser tabs allow us to be like an octopus playing Twister with our content. It isn't about load-time it is about mashing up all our attention.

My attention allows me to do certain things, your attention allows you to do certain things. We have very few mainstream societal tools that respond to this fact in a productive way. Our default for so long has been to build a system which looks at a single-focus attention, even though very few of us operate that way. It is believed to achieve the greatest average among the community - and that is why we are flattening out at average lately. As a society, we consistently underestimate our ability to process information. Davidson's book discusses the first speeding ticket being issued for the speed of 12mph; many people did not believe the human brain could make proper decisions at that speed: we did not evolve with that ability. (And as a bus commuter, I am well aware of most drivers having a gross overestimation of their attention while driving. STOP TEXTING WHILE DRIVING PEOPLE. However, I would guess so many people do this because we have lost faith in society and our institutions to truly understand our attention ability, so we have trained ourselves to test our own capabilities and ignore societal rules.)

If you pay attention (get it?) to Daniel Pink's Whole New Mind you know about the power of Symphonic Thinking. Or if you have read Steven Johnson's Where Good Ideas Come From (or at least seen this nifty video:) then you know the importance of connections and shared ideas. We are learning that the power of creativity is much more about these intangibles we call connections. Connections grow exponentially with variables. Single-focused attention reduces variables. We need to stop building an educational and workplace world where single-focus structures dominate. We need to allow variables and connections to flourish with abandon.

Please, embrace your scattered, complex attention. Be thoughtful and aware when society (teaching by subject, sitting at a workplace by department, taking a bus/google maps route that is always the same), culture (single channel media, more and more highly specific recommendations based on like-mindedness) and your own behavior (bucketing and pattern recognition that may not even exist) try to restrict your attention. I completely understand that these things all have advantages and very positive purposes, but we tend to see it as an all or none position (how meta?) and fail to recognize the opportunity to fulfill our attention's ability. Just be aware - it is your attention afterall - it is who you are and how you prioritize your life, shouldn't you give it more attention?

Hey, Look! A Squirrel!

Sam's cat

2011-12-13T17:35:00.001-08:00

Sam's cat, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

Sam's cat

Halloween Pumpkins of 2011

2011-10-30T20:12:00.000-07:00

2011

Well, the 7th year of us carving pumpkins as a family was good, good fun. We laughed, smiled and recollected. You can check out the entire Flickr set of this event we so enjoy to capture. This year Sam made a two-faced pumpkin, Mary's is in the middle and mine is on the right. (You can click on the years below to get the full stories of the past.

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

A 3rd Bone Marrow Biopsy

2011-10-29T09:42:00.000-07:00

Well, we started up the blog again with music, pumpkins are on the way - I guess we should hit upon another one of the major themes of the blog: What the $#%^ is going on with Mary's blood? (Hopefully, we'll get some hikes and comic book stuff soon!)

Mary has done an excellent job of keeping an in-depth record. If you need to catch-up, check out her recent blog post. But let me tell you about this week, where she leaves off in her post (she much prefers the interaction of Facebook and keeps most of her stories there.)

Short version- She checked herself into a hospital on Tuesday. She had a bone marrow biopsy on Wednesday. She was released on Thursday (with enough time for a nap at home and made it to the Grouplove show.)

Why did she have to go to the hospital? Primarily, two reasons:

1) She had a low-grade fever and a swollen gland. She needed some antibiotics and the doctor thought it best to administer them through IV.

2) The biggest issue with her heath has been her neutropenia, her lack of neutrophils which are the workhorses of the white blood cells and thus immune system. The other blood numbers were mostly fine. This single focus led to most people saying it was a problem of "destruction" not "production." Something is attacking the neutrophils, but she is making them fine. However in the past couple of weeks, we have seen a drop in both her red blood cells and platelets. This could be an indicator of production problems, which is the bone marrow. That is why the doctor wanted to peek at her bone marrow again. The big problem is still the neutropenia (she has literally had 0 neutrophils in a couple of her readings lately) - the other blood lines being down is more a concern as an indicator, rather than a danger in itself.

While the bone marrow biopsy was considerably less painful than the 2nd one (which Mary feels was more painful than childbirth) it was still a difficult one. The doctor had to basically go in three times. He was getting dry pulls - and even the third "wet pull" looked like it may be lacking in a decent sample for diagnosis. This sucks for two reasons - (a) did she go through that and not even get a sample? and (b) was the sample difficult to get because she has less marrow? (possible.)

We'll know more early next week. Anyway, the conversation has currently changed a bit after being kind of stagnant. Things that Mary "didn't have" are back in as possibilities. But it is all still unknown and TBD. She is working at getting into Stanford to work with a well-known hematologist there. She has an appointment with a specialist in Seattle. We haven't closed the door on UCSF either.

Also, we haven't been told that Mary needs bone marrow, but someone out there does - and it will save their life. Be a superhero. (It is only a cotton swab in the mouth.)

Albums of 2011 for me?

2011-10-29T08:53:00.000-07:00

Hi there. Sorry about the missing blog. I let my url drop - some Yahoo!/Dotster confusion. We seem to be good now. And life has been - well, hectic. (More on that later.) Also, more and more of this kind of activity has transferred to Facebook and Twitter. But, I do love my blog. My true journal. It feels more like a personal space than anything out there. I think I'll start blogging more. I've missed it.

Plus - it is almost PUMPKIN time!!

Let's start off with yet another music story. I'm currently listening to Red Hot Chili Pepper's Blood Sugar Sex Magik (one of my albums that will forever be 1991 for me.) It made me think: what are going to be some of my albums of 2011? (I know we still have a good 17% of the year to go - so we'll do a "so far" on this post.) I mainly want to do this now because 2 of the top ones are acts we've seen recently that I have yet to blog, so let's get the Top 3 done.

1. Sign No More - Mumford and Sons
OK, I know it seems silly to have an album from 2010 (2009 in the UK) as the number one album - but damn this album is so freaking good. Mumford was on our radar (thanks to the always great "Iron and Wine" Pandora station.) But, we didn't hardcore listen to it until we started prep for the Railroad Revival Tour earlier this year. This album is one of my favorites of all-time - every single bit of it is good, original and deeply unique. I find albums easier to rank than performances - but their performance was up there as one of the best of our music run this year, as well. They just pour energy off the stage and into the audience. It is quite lovely. Did you see them on Austin City Limits? Watch below:

Watch Mumford & Sons / Flogging Molly on PBS. See more from Austin City Limits.

2. The Head and The Heart - The Head and The Heart
Shout out to Khaia (how nice is it to have adventures in Switzerland over LinkedIn for a link...) for making sure we paid attention to this group. We bought the tickets to see them before we actually ever heard them, because they were opening for Iron and Wine. (I love when this happens - we had this happen with Ingrid Michaelson as well; she was main act for an opener we bought.) This album is also wonderful from beginning to end. Three lovely singers - I'm noticing that I'm really into bands that while having a "front man singer," they actually have multiple leads take on the singing in various songs. Charity Rose Thielen has a magic voice - like Norah Jones power and emotion. But rather than having her kick ass throughout - they just give us a spoonful of that honey - and it is pitch-perfect. We had the pleasure of getting to take Sam to see them during a gorgeous sunset in the midst of Treasure Island Music Festival. Definitely the kind of music that deserves grass under your feet, blue skies over your head and sunshine and ocean breeze throughout the experience.

3. Never Trust a Happy Song - Grouplove
Like the previous two, this is yet another debut album. Also, Grouplove is a band that we bought tickets for before we knew them. Actually, we bought tickets before they were even announced as part of the Outside Lands line-up. They were one of the OL highlights for us ... and for SPIN magazine for OL plus for SXSW and Lollapalooza. The album is a get-up and dance sort of album - the songs have some pop, but depth. However, to see Grouplove live is to love Grouplove. We were fortunate to see them in a small venue (Bimbo's 365) this week. The intimacy between the band, especially Hannah and Christian is touching and authentic. They produce the sort of set that allows you to get lost in all they do, especially when you have such a close view:

Since these are debut albums, I'm excited about many years of beautiful follow-up music. Thanks for the touring guys - now get back to the studio!

1991 - Albums

2011-08-28T12:39:00.000-07:00

I just realized that about 20 years ago, I was preparing to go to 10th grade ... for the second time. I've written about this experience on this blog. Many people know this event played a significant role in defining who I am as a person, educator and parent.

But I want to give thanks to the albums that got me through the rocky situation of being a 10th grader again, listed by how many times I'd guess I listened to them: [Album name - Artist (release date)]
1) Ten - Pearl Jam (August 27)
2) Blood Sugar Sex Magik - Red Hot Chili Peppers (September 24)
3) Nevermind - Nirvana (September 24)
4) Badmotorfinger - Soundgarden (October 8)
5) Girlfriend - Matthew Sweet (October 22)
6) Use Your Illusion I and II - Guns and Roses (September 17)
7) Diamonds and Pearls - Prince & the New Power Generation (October 1)
8) Greatest Hits II - Queen (October 28)
9) Uncle Anesthesia - Screaming Trees (January 29 - but I didn't hear it until the fall)
10) Temple of the Dog (April 16, but like most of the masses, didn't know about this until after falling in love with aforementioned Ten and Badmotorfinger)

These albums and the constant playing and replaying of them were so helpful in getting me to barrel through those tumultuous days. To all of you who make music. Thank you.

A few really wonderful things right now: Music

2011-08-20T11:05:00.000-07:00

So I've tried to put together a few narratives for the blog. I keep failing. I think I just need to vomit up several things rattling in my head. Perhaps I'll apply a coat of cohesion at some point and time.

Our #Rockcrowd Fest of 2011 was a wonderful experience. Sam is starting high school, so Mary and I will suddenly have more "just us" time. Our shared love for similar music is starting to manifest in all these music gigs. While this music-run started as a "vacation replacement," I think we'll see it continue as how we enjoy our time together and why we live in this amazing area.

Outside Lands. This is the story I've tried to tell and failed many times. It was very good. The best OL for me of the 3 times we've gone, because of both the festival/line-up but also we are figuring out how to make it a more and more pleasurable experience. Check out the Flickr set, if you are interested.

Friday was good. Release the Sunbird was a really nice kick-off to the festival. Joy Formidable was fun, but we only caught a few songs. The Meters showed us some "Senior Citizen Funk 101" which kicked ass, but there were sound problems that didn't allow them funk as much as I would have liked. By the time they solved those issues, we had headed to Foster the People (along with about 90% of everyone else at Outside Lands at that time.) It was quite crowded. But we did get to groove to Pumped Up Kicks, so that's good. Then came the surprise of the festival: The Limousines. I didn't plan on seeing them, but there was nothing else that had us captured at the time. Well, they rocked it.

While I am a big fan of their hit, Internet Killed the Video Star

My favorite song/performance is definitely Very Busy People.
Very Busy People by TheLimousines

We hung around for The Best Coast, which was okay. I like their music, but I'm more a fan of listening to a couple of their songs, rather than a full set/album. Their Drew Barrymore-directed video is good fun and a nice taste. The evening was bits of The Shins and Erykah Badu, but nothing really immersive for us.

Saturday was better. It was Rhett Miller day. We love Rhett; we saw him during our recent concert run. This time we got to enjoy an up-close and personal concert of him solo in the Serve Tent and then we got to go watch him rock out with the Old 97s. The evening ended with a rockout set by Muse complete with remarkable guitar riffs and freakin' LASERS! We saw other stuff throughout the day, but it was meh compared to Rhett (and co.) and Muse.

Sunday. Best day of the weekend. Best Outside Lands day I've had out of the 8 days I've gone. One of my favorite live music days ever, actually.

First of all, check this line-up:
1. Fresh and Onlys (full set)
2. Josh Ritter (acoustic solo half set)
3. Grouplove (full set)
4. Lord Huron (half-set)
5. John Fogerty (4 CCR songs)
6. Little Dragon (full set)
7. Beirut (full set)
8. Arcade Fire (full set)

Yeah, pretty incredible. This is the part I struggle to put in words. It was so good. First of all, I have two big-time new favorites from this day: Grouplove and Beirut. These are acts I'll probably continue to follow for quite sometime, so it was nice to get an intro to both on the same day. We also had pretty kickass positioning for seeing all these acts. Fogerty and Arcade Fire were on the Main Stage, and I've learned - don't bother getting too close. Enjoy being a part of a LARGE festival crowd and hang in the back. Save the "good seats" for getting closer to smaller acts that will soon play bigger stages (like Grouplove and Beirut.) The Serve tent gave us a chance to sit in the shade and watch a few acts (Josh Ritter, Lord Huron) up close. I'm still surprised more people didn't take advantage of this opportunity.

Anyway, it was just a great day and I am still unpacking my appreciation for these acts, so I can't really express it here, yet.

But while we are on music. Thank you to Spotify. Spotify is helping me explore music so much. And as someone who supports live music (obviously) this service is quite helpful. It is going to help me continue to pick shows.

Oh and speaking of live music and groovy music apps. Mary and I shazamed much of the pre-show music, to be able to investigate later. Well, we recently bought tickets for a show with one of our favorites from Outside Lands last year, Dawes. They are co-headlining with a band Blitzen Trapper, who we didn't know much about when we bought the tickets, but figured we'd dig it. Lo and behold, one of our Shazamed favorites was a Blitzen Trapper song! (It was Furr, if you are curious.)

Rock on!

2011-08-02T10:22:00.001-07:00

Later

2011-07-29T13:55:00.001-07:00

Phone and computer off. Mary and I are going for a drive. See you Tuesday.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #12

2011-07-23T10:36:00.000-07:00

The Dirty Dozen is complete. I'll write something comprehensive to close out our Rockcrowd tour, with lists and favorites and such. But let's first give #12 it's due credit.

The Avett Brothers!
Wow - to think we've gone from a small stage at Outside Lands 2009 on a Sunday morning to TWO sold out shows at the Fox - well done, gents.

And even though it was a replica of the Brett Dennen story, with a Sunday Outside Lands '09 performer doing a Fox show - the Avetts show had me smiling throughout. They continue to master intimacy and raucous energy at the same time (Mumford & Sons does a good job of this as well - probably why that Grammy Bob Dylan thing worked out so nicely.) Scott Avett has a bit of the Billie Joe Armstrong "pick the crowd up" ability while Seth melts your listening soul with his sincerity (and then they switch roles ... oh and instruments.) It is just pure talent.

a SF baptism

2011-07-16T11:04:00.000-07:00

I've never really felt as a "denizen of San Francisco"

This attitude is for a few reasons:
1) Chicago was such a grand town for me. And this where I came after leaving there. So, it was a "second city" to me.
2) We live in Marin - and very intentionally spent our initial time here being nature-explorers, rather than urban-dwellers (we'd already done that for a bit in Chicago.) You really have to live in the town to get a feel for it.
3) I was actually trying to get to Seattle rather than SF, but JWT sent me here. So, I had a second-second city attitude. My second-city was actually a second (squared)-city.

Now, I love the city of SF and have pretty much since we moved here, but just didn't feel a part of it. Recently, we celebrated our 5th year of being in the Bay Area. And I'm starting to more than ever feel a part of the city.

One strange thing - I find myself rooting for the SF Giants - and not just when Tim Lincecum pitches.

Of course, I still find myself rooting against them to tear a game open so I can see B.Wilson - but seriously, most Giants fans are in the same category...

Then this past Friday night, we had a uniquely SF experience.

We went with our friend Ellen to the Cartoon Art Museum to listen to a drag queen-hosted reading of Allen Ginsberg’s poem Howl.

We then headed to the Pied Piper bar in the Palace hotel. It gets it's name from a giant Maxfield Parrish mural of the Pied Piper story above the bar. I got the tasty Charlie Chaplin cocktail (absinthe, rye whiskey, dubonnet, honey, pischard bitters.)

The next morning, I headed to the ferry and opened my bag:

Spent PBR cans and geek paraphernalia - huh. I do love this city. I do embrace it. I do feel a part of it.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #11

2011-07-16T09:30:00.000-07:00

While Rockcrowd Concert #10 had me in a "why are we doing this?" mood - Rockcrowd #11 got me back into the "I'm so glad we are doing this" mood.

We went to the Paramount in Oakland to see Glen Hansard and Eddie Vedder. They asked us not to take photos in the seating areas, and I respect that, so above is all from the event you are getting from me. But, you can get an "official story" with pics from the Mercury.

First, Glen Hansard came out on stage with his beaten-up guitar - this was the same venue we'd seen him play before with Swell Season. As always, he was wrenchingly good. Besides his incredible original work, we were fortunate enough to watch him again shred the strings of his guitar for his cover of Van Morrison's Astral Weeks; I could watch that every night - it could be my "power song" for getting things done.

Then there is Eddie Vedder. I've written about him before on this blog (most of the videos are gone now.) And Mary and I had a less than ideal situation in seeing him with Pearl Jam @ Outside Lands. But this time, he did not disappoint. He came out, sat on a stool surrounded by instruments and told stories and sang to us. It was wonderful. Just so damn good. The program included this list of the stuff he had on stage with him:

He played a good mix of new stuff, "Into the Wild" and other solo standards and Pearl Jam. It was perfect. Quite frankly (and obviously), I've changed so much since Pearl Jam's Ten came out. I want to say I'd prefer to listen to Pearl Jam, but that was me then - the solo Eddie Vedder stuff is definitely much more where I am now. It is fun to experience that.

The crowning moment had to be the blend of worlds - Eddie Vedder singing Marketa's part in a "Falling Slowly" duet. Great night.

I wanted to buy tickets to the following night's show, but knew I should a) enjoy the fact that I had a remarkable experience and b) not kill myself with exhaustion & music fatigue.

ROCKCROWD! One show left...

A weekend without Sam

2011-07-11T14:31:00.000-07:00

Sam has been traveling the Midwest - he comes back for a short return home time, and then off to Hawaii, so Mary and I are trying out the being a solo-couple thing.

Not bad.

We had a nice 4th of July weekend:

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #10

2011-07-11T08:02:00.000-07:00

Rockcrowd #10 was probably my most disappointing yet. I had high expectations: Brett Dennen with Dawes opening @ The Fox in Oakland

Brett Dennen is someone I've been geeked out on since at least June 2008. We saw him in a small venue setting in March of '09, then again at Outside Lands '09 where he put on a soulful, happy set outdoors.

Dawes was one of our favorites from Outside Lands '10.

First of all, the sound seemed to be exceptionally crappy in the Fox that evening. I don't know if it is where we were sitting, peculiarities of that evening, my own personal funk-mood or just the fact that we are starting to notice these things more now that we are attending so many shows.

Secondly, I had seen both these groups in more intimate settings previously - this was a "big show" and you could feel the distance between performer and audience.

Third - this as my view:

If you want to stand up and sway and dance - why not go be on the floor? When she finally sat down, another person came down from her seats behind me to take what was deemed the prime dancing in the balcony spot. Don't get me wrong, I love dancing at Brett shows - it just wasn't a good setting for it.

Anyway - I still love Dawes and Brett Dennen - I'm just going to kind of forget this evening and spend more time with videos like this:

Walk Away Watch Me Burn from Brett Dennen on Vimeo.

A visit from out the humidity

2011-06-18T19:48:00.000-07:00

We recently enjoyed a visit from Dad and Liz. It was nice to hug my dad again after the recent stroke stuff.

He's doing great and Liz is wonderful, smart, fun and lovely as always.

After picking them up from the airport, we hit Silver House, the best Chinese I've ever had in San Mateo (and yes, the only - Maker Faire is once a year, so not many chances to make it to San Mateo.) The fook kin fried rice is a must.

On Wednesday, we did some Golden Gate Park time by seeing Wicked Plants at the Conservatory of Flowers (personally, I wish I'd read the book first), some Picasso at the DeYoung (a huge exhibit, I'm going to try and make several trips this summer, so more on that later) and even some fish-watching at the California Academy of Sciences. Phew. They aren't slowing down much!

We fueled up at Muguboka, a delicious Korean mom-and-pop sort of place. We all learned about banchan, the 13 small dishes brought out with the meal. Yum!

While those tastes of Asia were nice, the true culinary treat came with them taking us to Alice Water's Chez Panisse. We went on Wednesday, so here is the menu:

The server was nice enough to ask if we wanted and take our picture in the kitchen (as close as I come to a house of worship.)

It was beyond my words. So.

Interestingly enough, it may not even have been Liz and Dad's best meal of the trip, as they are did French Laundry last night! Thanks for the visit you two. Much love.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #9

2011-06-18T09:51:00.000-07:00

Rockcrowd #9 was a different experience for me. It was a bit like watching the movie, The Wrestler. Edwin McCain is known for this mega-smash-hit "I'll Be" - which is probably one of the Top 5 Wedding tunes of the past 15 years or so. Personally, I love his album "Austin Sessions" He has an incredible voice.

But this wasn't that vision I had of Edwin. This was Red Devil Lounge. This joint:

Not a sexy place for performing. This dugout is the kind of joint where, there isn't a GOOD seat in the house. Awkward stage angle, stage next to the bathrooms and pillars blocking almost any view. Bartender washing dishes during the performance - or yelling at the drunk lady "I'M CALLING THE COPS RIGHT NOW." Fat lady eating stinky Mexican food she brought in. Bar staff talking loudly, trying to pick up chicks during the performance. Cheesy drinks, like Starfucker (Rockstar + double Stoli.) A bathroom door that could seriously use some WD40. And more. SO much more.

It was a creative writing dream. I guarantee next time I need a hard-boiled detective shithole, I've found it. I may go there every night for a month with a pad of paper.

Edwin talked about "coming home from the warehouse" Not sure if it was a venue or a job? But Edwin's voice belting over the mess this place produced still made me smile:

And my mysterious bride enjoyed hearing one of her favs. (Seriously, getting Shawn Mullins, Rhett Miller, Pete Yorn and Edwin McCain in 3 months - we pretty much heard the soundtrack of the beginning of our relationship 7+ years ago - if not the most current of music scene!)

Things are going to slowdown for us a bit here. A gig once every 2 weeks or so. But who knows... (3 pints + the StubHub app is dangerous.)

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #8

2011-06-12T09:30:00.000-07:00

I know, right? They are coming at a blistering speed right now. Today, I have to get the post up about last night, because #9 is already tonight.

Luckily, we are finding time for rest:

This concert was at The Greek in Berkeley, so we headed over early and got some yummy Chicago-style deep-dish at Zachary's. Sam had a sleepover the night before, so he was pretty tired. We decided to show him the fine art of college lawn napping, a skill I mastered - in fact I was known for sleeping on pebble beds as well.

As you can see, we played in the shadow of the Campanile, Mary's favorite semi-building, semi-instrument type of structure. It gave us our first opening act. We heard it warming up a bit, so I wandered over close. Before the 6pm struck, I decided to experiment with a field recording of the playing. Given that I was starting off with the noise of something industrial whirring and lots of conversations, I just went with raw capture. I knew the wind would be difficult, but you have to get the full Bay-Area experience, eh? The recoding includes a guy asking help "getting to the Greek" and finishes with The Battle Hym of the Republic. I didn't capture the whole concert, because this was my first long soundcloud phone recording and I didn't know if I had restrictions, plus TBHOTR is a good close.

Campanile at UC Berkeley by cameronmaddux

Then we headed to the actual concert. Now, I am not a big fan of Dispatch - and I don't mean that in a negative way - it is more from ignorance. We are ironically "discovering" them in the midst of their Reunion Tour. We learned to enjoy a couple of their songs from Pandora suggestions. Then Mary liked how involved the band is with social causes, especially in Zimbabwe. This concert was more attended on a lark.

It turned out to be incredibly worth it. We knew The Greek to be a phenomenal venue: outdoors, trees, people, music. All quite lovely.

Nice jams. Glad we went. I am officially a Dispatch fan.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #7

2011-06-11T08:10:00.000-07:00

Lyle Lovett and John Hiatt on stage with a couple chairs and guitars.

That's it. Simple, pure, beautiful.

This rockcrowd concert is (currently) our only Marin show. (By the way, Lyle Lovett = rock? Interestingly, this was an idea that came up on stage - the "R-word." It was decided that Lyle definitely rocked that night.) While we are having fun actually "Getting out" for these shows, we definitely dug the short commute for once.

The format of the show is just what you'd hope. Actually, it wasn't a "show." Lyle pointed out that it was a song that just kept going all night. They came out and started talking to us. Someone in the audience shouted out a request, John Hiatt said "Alright" and started playing it. Then they talked about the song and based on the song and discussion Lyle played a song. This continued all night. Conversation that led to playing that led to conversation that led to playing. No setlist. Just two guys jamming together. Well, not together. Actually most of the time one listened while the other played; I always enjoy watching musicians watch musicians, especially in such an interactive format.

It was interesting timing for this show. I have been having fun playing on the hyper-actively buzzing turntable.fm this week. Music is best when it is social and responsive. This show was absolutely that.

It was also quite lovely to hold hands with my lovely sweetheart during Lyle's stories.

Tonight - OUTDOOR MUSIC!

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #6

2011-06-09T16:07:00.000-07:00

OK, I am really just putting this one up for the sake of doing it. I kind of promised myself I'd get a post up of the previous show before we went to the next gig. Well, we are hours from Concert #7!!

So - Show #6 - it was awesome!

I've got a feeling we'll remember as the first time we saw "The Head and The Heart" because those guys were really quite wonderful. Buy their album - quite worth it. This song, Rivers and Roads was what they closed on and I went from like to love during it.

Then we moved into the evening's main show: Iron and Wine

photo by WCHI News

There is just something magical about this music to me. One Iron and Wine truism: it is the BEST PANDORA STATION. For the concert, they experimented. Let us hear things that we wouldn't hear on the albums, and that was fun. He definitely has a 4th wall about him when playing. It is all about the sounds. Good stuff.

OK, sorry - lame post - but it is time for Lyle Lovett prep!

60Fed Speakers

2011-06-06T13:19:00.000-07:00

blue oompah by Tony Gonzalez

Kickass people came to chat with the students in 60Fed this semester.

First (02/23/2011) - we had a round of agency strategists who had all recently graduated from the program: Khaia Brogan (McCann-SF), Virginia Lu (AKQA) and John Quintana (Goodby, Silverstein and Partners). This experience was new for me - recent students from my classes, now working professionals. huh. This is how it is supposed to go, eh?

They were a big hit with the students. First of all, the three have this beautiful chemistry of differing personalities, but sincere appreciation for each other and both the student and strategy communities. They guided the students through many of their failures, successes, surprises and other stories in their education, finding jobs and "moving up the ladder." We had a full room of attentive students, who finally had the opportunity to see themselves reflected, even if only vaguely.

Second (03/15/2011) - we got disquiet. I was fortunate to meet Marc Weidenbaum a couple of years ago under what could have been professional collaboration, but because I took a left turn instead - we stuck to friendship. I talk about how critical it is to be a symphonic thinker: its importance to creativity, to survivability in today's economy and quite frankly to joy in life. Marc is one of those people that dives deep into sounds, music, games, science, comics, technology, connections, conversations ... He lets it all swirl and then illuminates. He's the kind of person that can get you thinking extensively, even if you just take a peek into what he's doing.

Bazaars and musical/cultural maps. These two things he discussed with us have stuck in my brain. I had just read about Michael Pollan trying to get us to "resolarize" the food system and Marc slaps me with how the internet is getting us back to the bazaar days of messy-organized exchange; btw, he referenced Cathedral and the Bazaar by Eric S. Raymond for further reading. Also, I have been assigning Cultural Maps as an assignment in my Intro to Planning class for awhile now. The depth, breath, creativity, simplicity, interestingness they offer is one-of-a-kind. Marc used these as tools in his presentation - it was lovely to see. The students greatly enjoyed hearing some ideas from someone outside of advertising agencies.

Third (04/13/2011) Rachel Coady and Matthew Scott stopped by our place to discuss connections and culture. They told us how to take who you are and apply it to what you do. They told us how to prospect, tell stories, be a conduit , how to assure and inspire, how to be awesome...

I love these two. I just do. And you will too if you are fortunate to play with them.

Fourth (04/05/2011) Gareth Kay popped into 60Fed. Gareth is wonderfully giving. Sincerely, I know few people as giving with their thinking and time as this guy. I'm very lucky he enjoys playing with us so much. He came by to present his current thoughts about Small Thinking. His blog has more about the ideas. It is good stuff that is impacting my "Art of Planning 2.0" thinking. I will get that up soon.

What a wonderful semester of idea sharing. Thank you to Khaia, Virginia, John, Marc, Rachel, Matthew and Gareth. You changed brains and hearts.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #5

2011-05-30T08:42:00.000-07:00

Falling behind on Rockcrowd Fest! But still going to get this one up before the next. On May 19th, Mary and I went and saw Shawn Mullins at Slim's. We started it off with a little playing in Dogpatch, including an early dinner at Hard Knox (which was rough considering I had a late lunch.) The highlight of the Dogpatch experience was the Mr. & Mrs. Miscellaneous ice cream.

Slim's was a new venue for us. Mary and I have learned while we do enjoy the sitting - we are not huge fans of shows where people are eating burgers and other grub mid-performance. It is just sort of bizarre. Also, the crowd was older and ... well obnoxious. But oh well. Moving on.

The show was wonderful. Shawn Mullins is one of my favorite storytellers.

He started with this story:

And ended with this one:

Crowds be damned - I love listening to this man play. And we'll see him again to fix the crowdwoes - no worries. It is fun to fix "bad crowd" experiences. Our next Rockcrowd performances is one of those: Iron &Wine. We've only seen him once and it was a horrible view at "Hardly Strictly Bluegrass" surrounded by cellphone talkers, etc. We left early. Now, we are going to the beautiful Warfield with pretty good seats in the midst of a chill week. ROCKCROWD!

#justsayin

2011-05-15T20:03:00.000-07:00

Duh. This will be the story through the series. (And yes - this blog just went from a music-theme to a sports-theme - deal.)

Oakland A's

2011-05-15T17:34:00.000-07:00

Despite having lived in the Bay Area nearly 5 years (I know right?!) and being a huge baseball fan, I had yet to make it to an A's game. Well, due to a fantasy pitcher infatuation and a bizarre but lovely weather pattern, Mary, Sam and I headed out to the game today. Yes I wore a Maddux Cubbies jersey, which rocked - because I didn't get the grief I get at a Giants game (despite the fact that the A's opponents were the White Sox.)

My new baseball love, Trevor Cahill, unfortunately did not pitch a gem - in fact it was his first loss of the season (and to the Southsiders no less . oy) but we had a wonderful time.

We also learned how to get Sam to fulfill the doctor's request that he consume more calories, especially protein and fat.

More pics in this Flickr set.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #4

2011-05-15T07:19:00.000-07:00

Rockcrowd Fest's 4th concert was by one of our early favorites. The wonderful, fun energy of Rhett Miller. More people are familiar with him as the lead singer for Old 97s, who we'll get to see in August at Outside Lands (of course I just noticed they are playing up in Petaluma on 06/03 ... hmm. Rockfest growing??)

We started off the concert with grabbing a Mission Burrito, since the venue was close to the area. We headed to El Castillito @ Church and Duboce - while not being officially in the Mission - it gets cred for being old school, authentic, damn good (and close enough.) Wet Pastor Spicy, Yes

We then headed to the Swedish-American Hall above Cafe Du Nord. The venue definitely has an old school, mason-viking hall feel to it: a big open space with lots of folding chairs. We thought it was kind of hokey place, but Rhett said he very specifically picked it. At first we sat on the floor, but then we noticed that the balcony while further away would give us a nice perspective and the ability to move around. The small crowd and no-alcohol venue produced what had to be my first secondary-pot-free SF concert , which was nice - because SF can have some serious skunkweed. The experience was quite intimate. While waiting to get in the show, we saw Rhett come out and just go for a walk - he gave us all a nice wave+smile. Once inside, we were able to explore around the cute little hall and look out the windows.

The concert was pretty incredible. Rhett, solo with a guitar on a red stage. He belted out somewhere around 30 songs. He told us wonderful stories (by the way, don't tell children "shush!" when they are singing.) While I greatly dig the new album, The Instigator will always hold a special place for Mary and I and our relationship developing in Chicago. We saw Rhett play a tiny morning set inside the Chicago Apple store one morning early in our "figuring out how much we loved each other" time. He has this raw intimacy in his songs, singing and arm-windmilling guitar playing. I look forward to many continued years of listening to Rhett Miller.

Plannery Day

2011-05-05T07:21:00.000-07:00

It is a day for geeking out on planning for me.

Planning Survey 2011 Every year Heather amazes me more and more in the accomplishment of this thing. I have had the pleasure of watching as she has single-handedly (well - with constant assists from the many great peeps in this community) turned this from a nugget of an idea to a global accomplishment that grows at an exponential level.

Also, Gareth Kay is coming by the school to share/play with some of the students. I tend to walk away from his brilliant insightful discussions with a remarkable enlightenment about how to further prepare the students and my entire class structure shifts. (I'm just glad I'll have a whole summer to prep!)

Good Night, Dad

2011-05-03T21:27:00.000-07:00

UPDATE: He is done with the procedure and fine. They need to run more tests, but he should leave ICU today. w00t!

Tonight, my dad is going to sleep in a hospital.

Normally, this isn't a strange statement to make - as an anesthesiologist, he's spent many a night there. But tonight it is as a patient.

I'm not so used to that. Not at all.

However, when I skyped with my dad about 3 weeks ago, he informed me that he'd had a minor stroke (making me 2 for 2 on genetic parents with strokes while relatively young.) A little later, I hear from my brother that he'd suffered another minor one. Now he has just had a third one that while not severe, it definitely is a significant occurrence. He is going through a serious procedure tomorrow to investigate what is going on exactly.

This is freaking me out a bit. My dad, as a father, a physician and a person who follows regular exercise and good eating and other lifestyle practices has always been a paragon of health for me. Most of my views of how to take care of my physical self trace back to his guidance.

Anyway, I didn't get to speak with him tonight. So:

Good Night, Dad. I love you.

Chicken with Explosive Pepper

2011-04-29T06:45:00.000-07:00

Last night, Mary, Sam and I had an early family birthday dinner in SF, because Sam has a birthday sleepover tonight. And we got the above dish: Chicken with Explosive Pepper. Yes, that is a GIANT plate full of peppers that you have to treasure-search though for chunks of delicious fried chicken.

I have a great job. I regularly meet people from all over the world and get to interact with them in meaningful ways. One of the surprising things I've learned is that many of our Chinese students have trouble finding authentic Chinese food experiences in SF, they head down to L.A. for it. (I know, right? As a stupid American - I thought SF had it.) However, one of my students mentioned that she had recently gone to the Szechuan Z & Y Restaurant in Chinatown and it reminded her very much of home. She brought some dishes to class, the one above and a Couple's Delight. Being Szechuan all the dishes we got had a "numbing spice" to them.

YUM. Being adopted Cajun, I'm a big fan of authentically-used spice. Most Cajun food outside of Acadiana tends to have a fake-level of spicing to it, like they are doing it for effect rather than flavor. Authenticity found.

#iheartsf

Happy Birthday John James Audubon

2011-04-26T10:09:00.000-07:00

I just had to give a quick shout-out to one of the American pioneers in right-brained scientific geekdom: John James Audubon

Thank you sir for all you've opened - and happy 226th!

Picture taken today at the Richardson Bay Audubon Center in Tiburon, CA

Stand-up desk

2011-04-23T09:24:00.000-07:00

Finally, I have a stand-up desk! There has been a lot of buzz about this again. I've actually felt strongly about this idea for a while. Like many people, this idea really rattled home for me over 5 years ago with discovering Donald Rumsfeld uses one. And say what you want about his politics - MAN HAS GRIT - and I respect that.

Recently, Dana (who I should also thank for the above links) decided she was going to make it happen, and above is the result. (I've since moved it closer to the body edge, but height is perfect.)

First week reaction:
+ I love it.
+ I find myself moving much more. I've always needed to move - I move my legs when I sit. I toss a baseball around (sometimes a cabbage patch doll head) when I lecture or converse. I spin pens in conference meetings. I pace when I'm on my phone. I move to think. Yes, this is a partial reason (but small role) for my failure to succeed academically pre-failing 10th grade. Classrooms and school schedules don't allow for continuous movement, just bursts. (Which is silly because we aren't pack animals - we're herd animals)
+ I'm fortunate to have a job that allows for lots of movement: classroom lecturing/playing. However, like many, I still spend lots of time on the computer. This week, there were times when I was working on the computer and wanted to sit down and rest a bit. So what do I do?? ... I sat down and rested. Took 5-15 minutes to chill. Today's phones allow for more than sufficient connection to the workspace. Or I read, or thought about things, or had a snack. And then got back up to work. This meant that sitting was for resting and not the default position.
+ I'm more present in conversations. I recently moved the desk against a wall, so that there stopped being a screen between me and my office visitor (this is as bad as a Cubs game playing on TV behind a date). But now I don't even have the option of sitting to chat with someone and being within arms reach of the computer. Be Present. Be Present. Be Present. My mantra moving into year 37...

BTW, I'm turning 36 - but that is all bullshit - you get that badge AFTER you've earned your 36 years - which is freaking me out a bit, because I just thought about that - so I quickly went from presently being 35 to heading into my 37th year next week over the course of a few seconds. I think I just lost 36.

UPDATE:
Mary just noted that the NYT piece mentions research from Pennington Biomedical Research Center, where I worked while in undergrad. Somehow I kept reading over that - PBRC references tend to pass right by my consciousness. I've been meaning to write a post about all the stuff I learned at PBRC - so glad I worked there rather than interning at an ad agency or something like that.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #3

2011-04-23T08:24:00.000-07:00

"This April, Mumford and Sons, Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros, and Old Crow Medicine Show will embark on a tour unlike any in recent memory. Traveling exclusively in vintage rail cars, the three bands will journey across the American Southwest over the course of a week. The aptly titled Railroad Revival Tour will feature the three bands playing concerts at six unique outdoor locations along the route, beginning April 21st in Oakland, California." - RRT website

Well, we're 3 for 3 on ending the evening with big smiles and great appreciation for artists doing what they do. The Railroad Revival Tour is one of the hot shows going on this spring - and we were very fortunate to be a part of it. A couple of notes:

1) My pictures mostly stink (except I dig the train pic above). However, you can find some amazing shots of the evening in many places, if you so desire:
+ Rolling Stone has 10 beauties, especially the Edward Sharpe sunset magic.
+ Jason Holmberg caught this beauty of Edward Sharpe stage joy:

+ The San Jose Mercury has a nice set that captures the experience.

2) The whole themed experience was wonderful. The combining of "folk rock" or "folk & roll" with a railroad revival was quite appropriate. And kudos for the tickets. I think it is a shame that as technology has improved - tickets have become the most unsexy pieces of crap. Why is there so much investment in "virtual badges" - but a complete drop-off in authentic badges!? Well, not for this show!

Not only do you get a nice physical ticket. It is gorgeous. It is unique to the show - all 6 shows have an individual design. It has your name printed on it (fuck you, scalpers). It has a code printed on it - with this code, I will be able to go to the RRT site and download all the music from all the shows!! (As I mentioned with the Ben Kweller show - the more music figures out how to get us the "bootleg" experience the more win-win.) This show has done a better job of creating a memorable, themed-experience than most of the big festivals I've attended - WELL DONE.

3) What an ideal time to see Mumford and Sons. These guys are h.o.t. The Mumford/Avett/Bob Dylan performance on the Grammys created quite a stir - vaulting them from really popular to securely superstar. They have one album released - Sigh No More - which is one of those amazing accomplishments, where every.freaking.song is goosebumps good. But they are definitely working on the 2nd album. We got to hear 3 new songs, including the hauntingly sweet "Lover's Eyes" (working title) - and make no mistake, these guys are going to hang around as one of the best bands on the planet for a while.

After 3 weeks of a concert/week - I am excited for a week to rest - but also sad that we don't have a #rockcrowd show.

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #2

2011-04-15T21:18:00.001-07:00

Bright Eyes, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

Just a quick note. We went to see Bright Eyes at the Fox in Oakland.

Wow.

I've been excited about seeing Bright Eyes for a while, but then Conor Oberst decided he was going to retire the band/moniker and do some different things. I wasn't a huge fan of the different stuff. I REALLY liked the modern rock, angry, jumping, energetic, storytelling Bright Eyes. Luckily - he brought Bright Eyes back.

It was amazing. His energy and angst is authentic and washes over you in wave after wave. I am a big fan of the new album. However - the highlight was getting to hear the song I was most hoping to see live: Road to Joy, complete with guitar destruction.

Spring is here

2011-04-15T18:41:00.001-07:00

Hair Gone, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

@Dave415 got me ready...

Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - Concert #1

2011-04-11T08:33:00.000-07:00

OK, I really want to make sure I keep a bit of a diary about what I'm now calling our Rockcrowd Fest 2011 - as a homage to a song from our opening headliner, Pete Yorn. Given that Concert #2 is tomorrow - I better get this up!

Concert #1 rocked. Mary and I started with some delicious Moroccan food from Aicha Moroccan. (Try a B’stilla - for my Cajun readers - it is like a meat pie and beignet in one!)

We went to Regency Ballroom, showing up promptly when doors opened at 7pm. Mary and I always arrive early to concerts, because we are suckers for opening acts; we've been fortunate to have more hits than misses. However, we showed up especially early for this show, because we heard you could snag a great front-row balcony spot, and we are old. But the upstairs was closed. dang.

We walked into the ballroom - and it felt like prom: scattered people, a stage and hardwood floor. There was "Seating for old people" off to the side and in the back. Survey said "NO!" We headed for the stage. Mary was thinking about 10 feet back - I was thinking of hugging the stage. Not because I wanted to be groupie cool - because I was feeling sick and I wanted something to lean against all night.

The opening band was OK - The Wellspring. Pretty fun. They had this interesting promotion, where the tour travel was being provided by LastMinuteTravel.com, and the audience could text their email address to them that evening and someone was going to get a free ticket anywhere in the U.S. - the strange thing was they just announced the email to the crowd - hope that person didn't care about privacy! Nice to see a brand doing things FOR people rather than AT people.

Ben Kweller was next. Wow. I've been a casual fan of his since college, which is fascinating since he is 6 years younger than I am! His music is genre-bending. Quite simply- he does things that no one else does and appears to impress the hell out of musicians who know what they are doing. You know how sometimes it takes seeing talent appreciating talent to truly appreciate it yourself? (Kind of like how every musician calls Prince a genius, and most of us just like how funky he is...) So, Ben Kweller rocked and played some of my favorites of his. The price of admission was worth it just for his performance. I scored the setlist, see above.

Interesting side-note: They recorded the whole concert and made it available on CD as one-track right after the show for $20. Really smart. The music industry is trying to figure out how to get people to pay for music - this worked on me. I LOVE THIS. How many times do you wish you could relive the show? I can actually hear Mary singing along on the track! Very smart. Very good view of the future. Check out the "bootleg" CD in the above pic.

Pete Yorn. Rocking. It was an interesting concert format. He has a new album, which I like ... but he is also celebrating the 10th anniversary of his breakthrough album: Music For The Morning After. So he is doing a few of these "MFTMA shows" - where he plays all the songs from the entire album (including the hidden track.) It was pretty groovy - this album is a Mary-favorite, so I'm really glad she got the experience. It was definitely the music I knew best as well. And since he played my 2 "must plays" from the new album (Velcro Shoes + Rock Crowd - with Ben Kweller - awesome!) I was satisfied on new stuff.

So, we ended up standing for 5 hours straight - 7-midnight. It made me quite excited that most of our shows are sitting! Oy. I did end up getting pretty sick a couple of days later. Today I'm finely feeling normal - just in time for tomorrow's Bright Eyes show!!

Oh and the Rockcrowd Fest 2011 closeout show (Outside Lands) line-up announcement is about to come out!

What our Spring will sound like....

2011-03-12T08:09:00.000-08:00

My dad always says "Whatever is world-class in your area, you should take advantage of it." This probably explains the immense amount of barbecue I ate in my 2 years of living in Austin, TX (well ... and the Cajun food my entire first couple of decades, and the Italian beefs and hot dogs in Chicago - my heart is very happy for the world-class fresh fruits and vegetables of California!)

The nice thing about living in the SF Bay Area is there is a pretty long list of "world-class" stuff to do. I have definitely noticed how much less into traveling I am in lately: less breadth of the world and more depth about my local.

Mary and I recently decided that we were going to take the Spring of 2011 (with our birthdays + anniversary time) to see some of our favorite musicians. We are hitting up 9 shows in 12 weeks (insane). So if you are curious about what of Spring 2011 sounds like (especially fading memory of Cameron of 2035), here is an idea:

Pete Yorn w/ Ben Kweller + The Wellspring
The Regency Ballroom, San Francisco, CA
Tue, Apr 5, 2011 08:00 PM

Bright Eyes w/ Farmer Dave Scher
Fox Theater, Oakland, CA
Tue, Apr 12, 2011 08:00 PM

Mumford & Sons, Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros, and Old Crow Medicine Show
Middle Harbor Shoreline Park, Oakland, CA
Thursday 21 April 2011 05:00 PM

Rhett Miller with Robert Francis
Swedish American Hall, San Francisco, CA
Saturday 07 May 2011

Shawn Mullins
Slim's, San Francisco, CA
Thursday 19 May 2011

Iron and Wine w/ The Head and The Heart
The Warfield, San Francisco, CA
Wed, Jun 1, 2011 08:00 PM

I couldn't find an Edwin McCain video that I dug... but the Austin Sessions is the best album by far.

Edwin McCain Trio w/ David Ryan Harris
Red Devil Lounge, San Francisco, CA
Sunday, Jun 12, 2011 8:00 PM

Dispatch
The Greek, Berkeley, CA
Saturday June 11, 2011

Brett Dennen - "San Francisco" from Michael Coleman on Vimeo.

Brett Dennen w/ Dawes
Fox Theater Oakland, CA
Saturday, June 25, 2011

This looks exhausting... but I love living in a place where the vacation fund can stay local!

Superstar Stage Charisma

2011-02-27T07:33:00.000-08:00

I saw Prince perform this week. A piece of advice: If you have the chance to see a performer who is commonly described as "dripping with superstar stage charisma" - jump at it.

Personally, I feel I have been 5/6 on my musicians who fit that bill. Personal chronological order:

Steven Tyler - OK, Aerosmith was my favorite band growing up (shhhh, don't tell) and I was standing against the stage - but wow. It was the Nine Lives tour - so even though much of the music was so-so - it was incredible to watch him belt out the songs. (Wins at Face)

Mick Jagger- without a doubt the champion of this list. I have always been a mild Rolling Stones fan, but watching Mick Jagger perform is other-worldly. I also got to watch this one in a Cameron Crowe-designed setting: an open, dark, construction-demolished luxury suite at Comiskey. (Wins at Overall)

Madonna - My disappointment. Which was surprising, given that Like a Virgin was (seriously) the first vinyl I ever bought with "my own money" - age 9. Let me be clear - the concert was AMAZING, but it was more about the quality of the performance and nostalgia of the music. Madonna just seemed to be pretty "settled" into the music.

Robert Plant - While I didn't get to see him in the Led Zeppelin days - I did get probably his second (and trust me, I understand this is a distant, DISTANT 2nd) best stage stuff: the stripped-down intimacy of he and Alison Krauss. It also helped that this was an outside, free performance. If it came down to voice alone - he would be the champion of this list for me without a single doubt. (Wins at Voice)

Billie Joe Armstrong - I've never seen energy like this performance. Billie Joe ran out at the beginning of the show and put the entire arena crowd on his back and carried them on his frantic journey for the next few hours. He never stopped, never let us rest - he took the whole production over and made sure we felt it. (Wins at Energy)

Prince -I'm still on my Prince high, so this isn't a fair assessment. The thing about these types of performers are it takes months to completely soak in all the residual impact of their performances. Prince was an absolute tease on stage - he played the crowd even better than he played the guitar he rocked most of the show. His timing was impeccable. Most shows drain me (in a good way) but the Prince show left me full of wonderful energy. (Wins at Timing and Moving)

OK - so looking at this quick evaluation - I appear to define Superstar Stage Charisma with Face, Voice, Energy, Timing and Moving. Yep - that sounds right. I think all of these people (including Madonna, even though I didn't personally feel it in the performance I witnessed) performed beyond expectations early in their career, then had the bar raised, which they performed above again, until the bar was raised to the highest possible level on this planet - and they still vault it with ease. Truly worth every damn penny to witness.

Where I sit on the Oscar Nominated Best Film 10 of 2010

2011-02-20T16:43:00.000-08:00

Oh, I'll find this fascinating 20 years from now...

My Top Tier - These two operated on so many levels for me: acting, storytelling, visuals and music.
The King's Speech
The Social Network

2nd Tier - I sincerely dug these three - all exceeded my expectations. Stories well-told.
The Fighter
127 Hours
Winter's Bone

3rd Tier - Good, exceptional in pieces, but no long-term seeds planted for me.
The Kids are Alright
True Grit

Just didn't do it for me
Black Swan - To be fair - I'm less than an hour removed from the theater and should let it sit a bit. Natalie Portman's performance was amazing. But the theme was so heavy and constant.
Inception - The only one I didn't catch in the movie theater - but to be honest I wasn't interested in seeing it at the the theater. This one never got off the ground for me.
Toy Story 3 - really? I enjoyed it, but I guess I'm jaded about what has happened to the whole franchise. The whole story is supposed to be about the authenticity of toys - but the Toy Story toy line has gotten to be, well ... ridiculous, right?

Popular movies (2010) that were not nominated for Best Film that will have an impact on me (that currently come to mind)
Exit Through the Gift Shop
The Town
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Kick Ass
Inside Job
The Other Guys

There is no canvas

2011-02-20T11:10:00.000-08:00

I have a strange job. I'm one of few people running a full BFA/MFA strategy department. If I'm wrong about that, please let me know. (Are there many of you out there? Let's grab more beers...) I know about the CCA MBA in design strategy - which I think is a wonderful idea. (The MFA-MBA discussion is a fun one - I suggest you start following the path here.) That is for another discussion.

Anyway - as people who have taken my class will tell you, I take this situation pretty darn seriously. What does it mean to teach strategy at an art school? Again, that is a longer, later conversation.

But, I do look to art for my inspiration. I have to tell you, I recently found something that keeps rolling around in my head: Fuck the canvas.

I think the canvas gets WAY too much credit. Furthermore, many people who are making decisions about how companies and people interact and communicate continue to place too much weight on the idea of a canvas.

First, I should give credit to those that are thinking in terms of canvas - that is a good first step. Because at least you are paying attention to the important idea - there is no audience. You have to make something interesting enough to draw people in - you don't get to blast away at us anymore. (Dan Gillmor and his brilliance also coming later - dang, I have many blog posts to write.)

Canvases for paintings were originally developed in the Renaissance. The word originates from cannabis because hemp was the original material of choice (not because of common stereotypes about artists.) This history seems to be one of those fascinating invention opportunities where all the shipping→sailing→sails→canvas going in/out of Italy during the 1500s led to uncommon resource availability to the Italian Renaissance painting peeps.

Canvas is wonderful for painting because it is durable, uniform, controlled and very un-present. It continues to be the preferred medium for most painting, I think.

Canvases allow the artist to control as much of the statement as possible and to predict what will happen when they create. The artist is in the 99th-percentile in deciding what is going to be pushed out to people.

That is how communications used to work. But those days are over. And we are creating something new right this moment. It is time to drop the idea of control over the canvas.

I prefer to think of sculpture, especially pieces like the Zimbabwe stone sculpture I recently had the pleasure of experiencing for a couple of hours. [Seriously, if you are flying out of ATL - it is worth getting there earlier just for this exhibit - despite the ridiculously shameful lighting.] The work is moving, but highly dependent on the stone - its color, shape, texture, size. While the artist still maintains most of the control - there is still an understanding that you are working with the stone. You have to find the appropriate stone to get your message. There is an awareness in stone-hunting that is not available to canvas-buying.

The material is more powerful and flexible - but the artist has to raise her/his awareness of that core material which evokes the mind, heart and gut of the person interacting with the piece. (This idea is one of the reasons I'm so excited about Koji Takei teaching a creativity class with us.) Communications is remarkably malleable and diverse today, but it demands more respect than ever. It requires more participation and awareness from the creators and participants. No longer do we go pick-up a canvas to splash our grand message - we now thoughtfully craft an appropriate interaction with material and people.

Just a test of the Droid Blogger app

2011-02-15T08:59:00.001-08:00

And a bit of sad commentary on me doing this while this scene is outside my bus window...

Why I'll be rooting for the Packers!

2011-02-06T09:10:00.000-08:00

GO PACKERSand the 5 reasons why.

1. While my first cultural allegiance is Cajun, my next is my Dutch heritage. We always choose the most cheese-based option. Spurred by my brother's insight, I'll be making some of my mom/Ginger Rankin's Pimento Cheese today:

1 lbs. mellow longhorn colby cheese
1 4 ounce bottle pimento
3 Tbsp. sugar
3 (ice tea spoons) sweet relish
mayonnaise
4 hard boiled eggs.

Let cheese come to room temp. and grate.
Add the chopped eggs and pimento.
Add sugar, relish and mix in enough mayonnaise to taste.

I also have some Wisconsin Gouda + apples for the game munchies.

2. I worked at Lambeau Field in the fall of 2002. This experience was almost nothing like my Wrigley experience, despite the fact that it was still "Serving food in the luxury boxes" (but that is for a later post.) However, I'll never forget walking through the tunnel and putting my foot on Lambeau Field - it is definitely one of the major temples in American Sports (that is not a metaphor - it IS a religion.) I met some lovely Packer fans though the experience - and I'm hoping they are enjoying today immensely.

3. While I truly believe in the glorious pain and suffering that I went through to finally make it to last year's crowning moment (YES, I AM ENJOYING THESE FINAL FEW HOURS OF NEW ORLEANS SUPER BOWL CHAMPS!), I kind of like the idea of little Milo getting it on his first SB.

4.As I mentioned on Twitter, this Super Bowl features a great recasting for the Warriors Three in Brett Keisel, Troy Polamalu and Clay Matthews.

And while two are Steelers and Keisel's beard makes even me and my beard cower - I give the most props to Matthews. Because ... Clay's uncle, BRUCE MATTHEWS IS A ROCK.

5. In the most important category - It is Green Bay 3, Pittsburgh 1. GO PACK!

I have the cutest niece in the world

2010-12-02T11:50:00.001-08:00

the first haircut

i heart Avery

Play DeathSpank

2010-11-30T08:17:00.000-08:00

My friend, Anthony recommended the game DeathSpank to Sam and me a while ago. But it was the beginning of the semester and the email entered the long list of "things to look into at some point in time."

Fortunately, I've been in quite the "investigating games" kind of mood lately.
1. Class last week was about students bringing in games they had made. I've had many thoughts on gameplay and the future of whatever the beast that is advertising. (I'll write about this soon, but my head is currently full of snot.)
2. In class, we watched the remarkable Jesse Schell Dice talk, which always gets me thinking about the even more impressive (but too long for class) Long Now lecture.
3. Then, I read this comprehensive article on "Everyone's a player" in Fast Company.

I decided it was time to play something new and think about it. The great thing about being a strategist/planner (my gosh when will we come up with something better to call ourselves?) is that as theoretical ideas swirl in your head you can jump in with hands, eyes and other human experience devices and start doing while thinking.

It was time to download this DeathSpank thing. When Sam came home yesterday, we first had to endure a couple hours of homework. Then we started off with a bit of Marvel vs. Capcom 2, which we haven't played in almost a year. This was fun, but it is old school gaming so it is one of the few video gaming things where I eat Sam's lunch.

After I had enough (4-0), I asked if he'd try out DeathSpank. I thought it was 1-player, but when we started it up we noticed there was a cooperative option. Now this is where it gets really cool. The 2nd player is a true side-kick. You are that lame wizard looking guy in the image above and your role is really two-fold: to help DeathSpank attack and to occasionally heal him. That's it.

It set's up this great dynamic rarely found in co-op games. DeathSpank's player controls the action and achievements; the wizard supports him. As a father-son situation, this rocks. I get to support Sam in his decisions and gameplay. He guides the character through the options. I can even very easily leave the game and come back in later while he plays. It's brilliant.

Too often co-op's have equal distribution of "game power" which leads to group decisions where influencers and leaders tend to dominate. Or a rational argument is made to do something. If things don't go well or break social structure, the whole group suffers. (Yes, we're talking Leeroy Jenkins here.) Obviously, there are many valuable lessons to learn in that situation, but it shouldn't be the only option. When you are in a parent-child situation, you want to play together but try to avoid decision arguments, we have enough of these in real life training: WAY too many in my opinion. (The reason you should go to bed, eat your vegetable, brush your teeth, do stupid homework, use your words, blah, blah, blah is...) This game gives a rare opportunity for a completely different dynamic. Sam makes the decisions and Sam's character deals with the consequence. I just help and participate.

Great game.

Other reasons to support this game:
1. It is hilarious and beautiful. These were the original reasons I wanted the game. Sam and I actually LOL'd several times and he was repeating lines this morning. (Why the fisherman and the Greems don't get along was worth the $15.)
2. Game creator, Ron Gilbert (aka Grumpy Gamer) has a thoughtful tirade on corporations (esp. a certain iron-handed, fruit-based one) crippling creativity and innovation. Why wouldn't you support this guy?

Next on the list: Costume Quest.

Slightly related photo of Sam getting to play games with Uncle John down in L.A.

Quite thankful

2010-11-27T11:23:00.000-08:00

We had a thankful time. Thankful for our happiness.

Love to you all from us.

Stanford University visit

2010-11-13T07:15:00.000-08:00

We went to Stanford last weekend. This adventure started as a visit to cousins on Mary's side, Heidi and Andrew and their German friend, Lisa who is considering advertising as a career. We went for lunch, chatting and a football game - but it was much more. We saw:

a water polo match

the cooky band

and we even got on the field after the Stanford team manhandled Arizona. (I wouldn't mind seeing Stanford v LSU in the bowls - but I like the idea of LSU going to the Sugar and me still getting to pull for Stanford in the Rose.)

Overall, it was a remarkable experience. The energy of a college campus for the opportunity to observe community, diversity and freshness is unparalleled.

The Flickr Set

Blinkybugs!

2010-11-07T19:00:00.000-08:00

Tonight, we made blinkybugs. Get some! Actually, go to MakerShed and get whatever floats your boat!

Flickr set.

Fear the Beard and The Freak!

2010-11-01T20:38:00.001-07:00

Fear the Beard and The Freak!, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

I am very happy for these two (Brian Wilson and Tim Lincecum) - and all my SF Giants fan friends.

What a series! Dominant pitching got them there and carried them through to the end.

Damn - there went the cheap seats!

Congrats SF Giants. Thanks for the great baseball these past couple of years.

Love,
Cam

2010 is looking like a good Halloween year...

2010-10-29T19:09:00.000-07:00

The city is covered in Orange + Black. And we got from:

to:

Although, it got ugly at times

The whole show is up on Flickr if you want to play. Enjoy the weekend everyone.

2010-10-25T11:47:00.000-07:00

2010??
Wow. If it's time for pumpkin-carving, it's another year I've been blogging. 5 years of blogging and I still love reading the stories of my past self and sharing stories for my future self.

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

The Match-up

2010-10-24T07:40:00.000-07:00

This World Series will be a fascinating study for me. I'm excited about both teams, but not overwhelmingly a fan of either.

1) It's hard to be a Giants fan if you are a Cubs fan. If you are not familiar, the last Cubs World Series - yes, 102 years ago. The Cubs beat the New York Giants in the NL pennant, a young 19-year-old's"boner" would play a big part (seriously, and yes you can click it). Anyway, the rivalry has stuck for us - baseball has the longest memory on this planet.

2) But, San Francisco is definitely my new home. I love this town and the people here. I have many SF Giants fans friends.

3) I do like this team. (1) I have been a big Tim Lincecum fan, since he came up. Regularly buying bullpen seats on his starts and watching The Freak warm-up. (2) How can you NOT like a team of Castoffs and Misfits? (3) Brian "Fear the Beard" Wilson from ... LSU.

4) HOWEVER, my third favorite athlete of all-time is the part owner and team president of the Texas Rangers, Nolan Ryan. Nolan Ryan and the Houston Astros = my granddaddy = why I love this game so darn much.

5) While in Dallas, besides the people there weren't many things that made me happy. But the Rangers was definitely one of them. The team was awful - but going to the park was still a blast. That ballpark kicks butt (to be fair both teams have model parks, but Rangers win because its not named after a stupid brand.) I saw Cal Ripken Jr's farewell game at the Ballpark - that was a pretty sweet time to be a baseball fan.

6) The best baseball cap I ever had was a Pudge Rodriguez #7 Texas Ranger hat. (Yes, things like this matter.)

It'll be interesting. I'm actually excited. I think I'll be able to enjoy the games and just get excited for good baseball (especially good pitching.) Sure, I won't get to feel the ecstatic joy of MY TEAM WINNING IT ALL. But, with a Saints Super Bowl victory last year and recent LSU baseball and football National Championships, I'm still good.

Our classroom building is just a couple of blocks from the AT&T park and along the major fan thoroughfare - so that'll be fascinating. When I'm walking around the park, many people assume I grew my beard out for the Giants. Sure, why not... next step?

Good Luck Giants and Rangers - give us a great Series!

Cameron, what do you do at the Academy?

2010-10-23T06:48:00.000-07:00

This. At least, I'm trying.

Working with Roland, Steve and Luke is an honor, by the way.

Christina Churchill is the rockin' planning student who made this video (with an assist from Fanny Reuterswärd) someone will be lucky to hire them one day.

Why it was so good.

2010-10-11T07:58:00.001-07:00

Ophelia's Madness, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

OK. Let me see if I can articulate a few reasons why the Hamlet production was such a treat.

1) We took a boat to it.
2) We were on a prison island - "Denmark is a prison." The prison feel is used as a device over and over. Watching through a fence or cell bars the illusive mind of Hamlet unravel - perfect.

3) When the actors talked about wind, firmament and sun - there was actual wind, sky and sun.
4) The sun set and the temperature dropped with the decline of Hamlet's mood.
5) We would follow the actors from scene to scene. Blood circulation is a lovely thing when going through a Shakespeare drama.
6) Sam practically ran from scene to scene, so as not to miss the action. You can now have wonder-filled conversations with him about the story of Hamlet. Hoo-ray!

7) Not only was every location different, but you could move around the scene. I was able to frame the scene as I wanted it, not as my chair and stage set it before me.
8) Rosencrantz and Guildenstern asides. One time during a Polonius and Ophelia conversation, these two did a touch of "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead" on the fringe of the audience (where I happened to be.) Another time, they were doing the "Heads" coin flip bit while we were walking in between scenes.
9) The day-to-day of my life makes it difficult to relate to a suicidal prince contemplating murder while dipping in and out of psychosis. Alcatraz is part of my daily commute - but it is steeped in deprivation and violence. I was finally able to contemplate Hamlet during the performance, rather than just through lone study.
10) I stood alone next to Ophelia inside an Alcatraz cell while she overheard the "To Be or Not to Be" soliloquy. For the first time, I listened to it not from inside Hamlet's mind, but a loved one's.

I just wanted to jot that down so I don't forget.

Hamlet on Alcatraz. Seriously.

2010-10-10T14:52:00.000-07:00

From just a few rows back, I've watched Sir Derek Jacobi perform Macbeth at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford.
I've been to Shakespeare's grave and memorial statue at "Poet's Corner."
In high school, I acted in two Shakespeare plays.
As an undergrad, I took 2 Shakespeare-only literature classes.

However, yesterday on Alcatraz Island, I had my most meaningful Shakespeare experience yet. Without a doubt. Not even close. I'm glad to have played a minor role in kickstarting it. (By the way, go kickstart something yourself.)

Running around with a thrilled Sam, seeing Hamlet with all its complexities performed by the We Players on a National Park of a dying prison on a perfect warm evening is beyond description. [UPDATE, not completely beyond.] I'll let a couple pictures try to give you an idea:

I would tell you to get tickets. But they are booked. You can show-up at Pier 33 and try to get on the waiting list... Otherwise - support We Players and watch what they do next.

Life keeps going

2010-10-09T10:18:00.001-07:00

In case you don't know or remember what it was like back then...

2010-09-18T07:57:00.000-07:00

This is a letter sent by my wife as a child to her cousins. It is mostly a frantic plea to help in the gaming exploits of she and her brother John.

This is when gaming (software) and computer technology (hardware) was taking off, but the communications revolution wasn't as mainstream (no internet, pay by the minute long-distance phone calls).

Man those freaking disks were SO annoying! The prevalence of "copying as benevolence" in those days is so telling of where we would end up.

Thanks to the lovely Amy for finding this. I'll be forever thankful... And thank you to my lovely nerdy wife, who makes me happy in so many ways.

Scans and transcription below:

[Page 1]
Dear Alan and Amy,

Alan will be happy to hear that the stopsign [sic] at the intersection of Highland and Maine is no longer blocked! They cut off that limb about two days after you left!

Kenny is here for a week. He is asleep now probably still recouperating [sic] from yesterday. We went to a lake with a rope swing and pulled muscles in our arms and got sunburned.

We may not have fireworks next year because at the big Columbus display a woman was killed. This may not be true, we may still have fireworks, but mom thought we ought to tell you.

As you can see we're sending you the Treasure Island disk B. We just figured out how to get

--->

[Page 2]
past the drunken sailor and saw land, we inserted disk B and it just kept saying "Put disk B in drive A and press any key to start." We did and it just said it again. Could you try to recopy disk B and send it to us. We really want to get on the island!

We've also been enjoying space quest, but we are stuck. We got away from the spider, across the grate, opened the door, found and exit in the acid pool room, but how do you get past those beams?!!!

Also did you know that in the cartridge room if you "look at panel" it shows a cartridge slot. But everytime [sic] we try to insert the cartridge an alien comes in and shoots us. Is there any way to lock the door? What can we do to keep the alien away?

[Page 3]
Is there any way you can send me a copy of your friends map of Zork I?

How are you guys doing on Mercinary? Have you gotten to the Colony craft yet? We still haven't, if you have how?

What have you guys been doing lately? Are you ready for school to start? I know I'm not!

I still don't know if I can send you a copy of the Alternative Reality game. They sent it back to us and it still doesn't work. When we get a good one I'll try to copy it for you!

Love always,
Mary Powell

P.S. Please Write Back Soon! We are eager to get farther in those games!

Flickr Set.

Another evening

2010-09-16T21:57:00.001-07:00

Sam and Richardson Bay, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

Sam with a stick by Richardson Bay.

Perfect Life

2010-09-15T07:36:00.000-07:00

I don't know what is next, but I think it'll look like this:

NW Apt.

Band Of Horses | MySpace Music Videos

I'm getting excited about seeing Band of Horses next week!

Surfer @ Rodeo Beach

2010-08-29T21:18:00.001-07:00

Surfer @ Rodeo Beach, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

I love where we live.

5 p.m. Sunday evening. Mary: "Who wants to go to the beach?"

Within 30 minutes we are watching surfers, dogs and the Pacific Ocean @ Rodeo Beach.

Marin is good.

Peace before the semester begins.

Quick update

2010-08-18T11:31:00.000-07:00

So, I'm on "vacation" ... but I'm not really. This semester has actually been my most difficult in getting instructors to come teach. Given the recent planner survey (out today! Heather's absolutely amazing; I'm so glad we had a chance to share a small part of our lives together...) I assume it is because despite the economy, planners are doing well. And understandably so. When things are broken - those who focus on fixing are quite busy.

Anyway, I am currently looking under rocks for brilliant, passionate, curious amazing people to teach classes! It'll come together - it always does (right?)

However, we're still trying to fit some vacation in to this week. Two highlights - All of Outside Lands + a day at Bodega Bay.

Outside Lands:
Saturday
1) The Whigs - What a surprise! These guys got things started right! I would like to see them again.
2) Freelance Whales - Groovy fun made me smile.
3) Dawes - Best singing along of the entire show.
4) Langhorne Slim - this was a sit on the hill and chill a bit performance. Which it did quite well.
5) Gogol Bordello - WAY more fun than I thought. We went from "Don't need to see them" to jumping up and down screaming for more.
6) My Morning Jacket - we went front row, and I'm glad we did. What a show. Seriously, words do not describe MMJ - the part of your brain it excites is nowhere near the language center.
7) The Strokes - We were dead tired, but had fun listening to the music from a hill.

Sunday was strange. We showed up tired from Saturday, but ready to go. However, it started off kind of lame. Little Wings were so whiny and just an awful way to start the morning. So we headed to Quinn Deveaux & the Blue Beat Review, who were so-so. Then we tried Soft Pack - strike 3 - nothing really exciting happening on that stage either. Luckily, Amos Lee broke the funk by bringing the funk. Nneka wasn't as evocative as you expect her to be. Devil Makes Three was okay, but I prefer listening to them at home while I'm drinking whiskey. We went to go grab the beginning of Janelle Monae before checking out Edward Sharpe, but she was late so we just wasted our time. Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros was PACKED - and the show was so darn good. However, the experience was less lovely than I expected due to some idiots who kept unsuccessfully trying to crowdsurf by crashing into me. We got out and the RESCUE began:

The Revered Al Green gave me a few songs to lift my soul.

We found a nice spot to rock out to Phoenix - probably my favorite performance of the festival. Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix is the perfect sunny SF outdoor performance album. I will definitely be at their next SF-area show.

Social Distortion rocked Old School and Kings of Leon rocked New School. What an ending to the festival!!

+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_

Why go anywhere for a vacation when this is a short drive away? We saw a whole bunch of Grey Whales from the beach, climbed rocks, read in the sun, explored tide pools and played with sand. Lovely.

A nice quick visit

2010-08-12T08:47:00.000-07:00

This past weekend, I got to do a few of my favorite things: warm-up in Wrigley Field bleachers and visit with Eric, Sarah, Avery and Ian. I have a Flickr set of the time there (mostly focused on the cutest part: Ian and Avery.) Unfortunately, I grabbed the old, slightly-broken, less impressive camera on my way out the door (can't imagine why I did that given that it was around 4AM??) I did snag a pretty cute video of them going through a picture book ("chicken - bwauk-bwauk!" For some reason kids saying funny things about chickens is becoming the theme of my YouTube):

Thanks to the Maddux fam for all the hospitality; please know you are all missed in a BIG way. Glad the kids are California dreaming already though. Maybe they can hitch a ride in the orange truck with Kevin the remarkable driving fox/zebra/alligator/rhino/horse/dinosaur, et. al or when the dragon goes on his next gold-finding mission???

The Chicken is ALIVE!

2010-07-25T09:45:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, we drove up to Petaluma for the Rivertown Revival Festival. It was a free fest, where you end up just walking around, looking at people, drinking beer, eating different things, listening to music and soaking up some sun (what we in SW Louisiana call "this weekend.")

I first learned about the festival from Boing Boing's SRL shout-out. Survival Research Labs is not easy to describe (that's why we have wikipedia), but the performances are large robot dance-rodeo-fights with an emphasis on the art and expression of destruction, rather than efficiency. We watched the Big Arm, The Running Machine and The Chicken perform. The first performance was fun, mild and sans-Chicken. The second performance is captured in the video below. The Chicken is decapitated around 3:50. The video that leads into this blog post is of small, revival-dressed children running around happily cheering for The Chicken which is starting its warm up: The Chicken is ALIVE! They had a tough time watching the Chicken get picked-on and decapitated. I just hope they left before the Chicken was destroyed in the 3rd show.

What a fun day.

Celebrating those who fail you

2010-07-19T13:07:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, we were visited by what remained of the Broke Down Bus fellowship: Cabell and Katie Tutwiler. Cabell is one of my high school Literature teachers; it is because of him that I started my appreciation for The Canterbury Tales, Milton, Shakespeare, Gilgamesh, The Odyssey, and many more.

However, he holds an incredibly special place in my heart. Mr. Tutwiler was the first person to fail me, like really fail me. 9th grade English - F - needs to be retaken. This was the only class I failed that year. Unfortunately, failing just one class was enough to concern me, but not change me. It wouldn't be until a year later when I failed almost every class in 10th grade that I changed my academic behavior.

But, it was an important first step. (The summer school make-up with Lee Dirks introduced me to the influential Nine Stories and 13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird.) I'm so fortunate to have had passionate, unique and caring teachers in my life like Mr. Tutwiler, who were brave enough to know that failing me was the best thing to do for me.

Do you celebrate the people who fail you? The ones who get you to be the better self you know you are capable of creating and being...

It was a lovely day with cheese, conversation, walking, Iko Iko, dialogue, happy hour, pelicans and picking fresh blackberries. I wish the bus and fellowship great adventures.

100,000 views later

2010-07-12T15:38:00.000-07:00

A little over 4 years ago, I was sitting in the sunny grass reading Barack Obama's Dreams from My Father. I thought the simple image of a good book in grass tells a story that I wanted to capture and share. I put it on Flickr. Just today, I've hit 100,000 views (not including me) on Flickr.

Not a big deal, but still makes me stop and go WOW. Don't get me wrong, I understand my photophiliac mom makes up the bulk of that - then other friends and family - then random blog readers - then random people through Flickr and search engines- then people who find the images as they are reused, etc. But there is something interesting in the sheer number of views.

The book in the grass story has held up well, being my 7th most viewed image with 201 views.

6th - Vaillancourt Fountain - it was on some message board about things that are ugly but still loved

5th - Yes, Birkenstocks - Mary in snow in her Berks

4th - lukens_lake_tickle -

3rd - endless nevada road

2nd - The Letter N (on a bench)

1st - knots rope swing tiburon (829 views) - I think this one ended up on a book cover in Italy or something... This one gets pinged every couple of days or so from Google or Yahoo!

This is cognitive surplus at work. I've seen the Sam and Tori whisper picture in at least three blog posts from people I don't know discussing new communications. Whispers and sharing are nice ways to communicate; I'm glad we're doing it more.

8-bit San Francisco

2010-07-12T08:52:00.000-07:00

I like where I work in this Zelda-esque plan. South Park is exactly like that actually.

Yesterday, we did interesting things...

2010-07-11T18:30:00.000-07:00

Mary, Sam and I went to the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts to see TechnoCraft, including a stop from the Threadless tour. We then had lunch at Tropisueño. One of Mary's friends, Anne came by with some boys and swooped Sam away. Mary and I headed to the Contemporary Jewish Museum to see the Maira Kalman exhibit, before we watched some Capoeira in the park while eating Beard Papas.

OK, that was the fast, stated version. Feel free to move on. Now a bit more reflective.

I really wanted to see this TechnoCraft exhibit. Here's a piece from the description that explains why: Special attention is paid to the intersection of technology and craft that encourages an unprecedented level of user participation with profound implications for the future of design and experience making. This is what Clay Shirky is talking about in the must-read Cognitive Surplus. The exhibit talks about Modules, Hacks, Crowdsourcing, Platforms, Incompletes and Blueprints. I don't have a picture of Blueprints, because this is where I was told I couldn't take pictures anymore; fortunately, Threadless wonderful human being Cam Balzer has a picture of exhibit curator Yves Behar standing readably close to Blueprint. It is worth reading each description.

**OK, this is where I stop and bitch. WHY do you have an exhibit for "Hackers, Modders, Fabbers, Tweakers and Design in the Age of Individuality" but don't allow us to take pictures to mod, share how we like to share, or even store appropriately in our memory? This really annoyed me ... it is a HUGE TECHNOCRAFT FAIL. When will people realize that we are all "press" in respect of helping you promote the things you do? I would have loved to include relevant images on this blog and in my lectures. It would probably encourage a few people to go. Ugh. OK Back to positivity.**

The installations were really fun and fruitful. I can't sum it all up. But it made me appreciate how quickly we are headed to a new order. If you are in SF, go see this thing. It is cheap and relatively quick to experience.

Highlights:

+ Seeing Martino Gamper's 100 chairs. Seeing the 100 chairs in front of me really showed off how simple and everyday this movement is.

+ The Threadless cone - I heart Threadless and have for a while now (at least December 2006). Oh cool note. I saw this couple walking around wearing Threadless shirts. I told one of them, "I love that shirt! It is one of my favorites." She said, "He designed it" pointing to her companion. It was the very awesome Jesse Lefkowitz. (I love the shirt so much I wear it to Joe's Taco Lounge!) I also got in the Threadless Trailer (since they are smart, they allow pics) and they gave me one of the cool tour shirts (the light blue diamond shirt on the left; I'm wearing it now, since I had to remove my orange shirt.)

+ The PlayCraft assignment that was part of the exhibit. We got to run around designing our own postcards. (I grabbed a pic while hiding in the bamboo outside!)

+ Max Lamb's Pewter stool; Sam now wants to go do this - who wouldn't?

Hexagonal Pewter Stool from Max Lamb on Vimeo.

Anyway, this celebration is just one of many that shows how wonderful things are getting. More building, making, creating, helping, thinking, designing ... less consumption and passively having things shoved down our throats. Go check it out. Next ...

The Maira Kalman exhibit is truly beautiful as well (and just across the street from TechnoCraft). She is such a wonderful person to explore. The below description of her and the way she creates may be the ideal explanation of a perfect student for the program we are building. Seriously, if you are a planner, read this and see if you wouldn't hire this person immediately.

Again, I don't have pictures. Another museum exhibit that would rather I didn't share with you. Sheesh. I can highly recommend both The Principles of Uncertainty or if you are a writer and need a copy of Elements of Style (aka Strunk & White) I'd get the copy she illustrated. Her NY Times blog posts are where I first fell in love.

My head was swimming all day with possibilities. If you are currently in search of possibilities, go spend a day checking these out. (BTW - CJM is free Sunday, July 18th)

The victory is in the cheese

2010-07-11T10:27:00.000-07:00

Today, we'll be having two Dutch Gouda cheeses. Uniekaas on the left, Orgouda Mild on the right, and crackers courtesy of our Swedish friends at Wasa. Freshly-oiled olive wood cheese board (dank u, Mom.) Grolsch in the fridge for half. Dutch chocolate cookies waiting for victory (or the unspeakable alternative.)

Hup Holland Hup!!! I've got my #9 jersey on - so I'm predicting a big day from Robin van Persie! Enjoy the game everyone.

Happy Birthday Mom!!

2010-07-04T08:46:00.001-07:00

Mom and the Rodeo Beach Sunset, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

I love you very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very very much! (yes, 65 verys...)

A note about Pride

2010-06-28T19:37:00.000-07:00

I didn't want Pride Weekend to go out without one quick note from me on my soapbox.

As previously mentioned, Mary and Sam are on vacation for over 2 weeks.

I think every married person who is against gay marriage should go without their spouse for 2 weeks. When they go to bed, they should feel an emptiness. Then either:

A) They don't feel that emptiness. If that's the case, then they really shouldn't be speaking out or making decisions about marriage, or
B) They need to ask themselves why on earth would they want to make someone feel that emptiness. Because that's what they are doing.

Remarkable strides, yes. But seriously, it is time to make this legal now.

Lonely night perfection

2010-06-28T19:22:00.000-07:00

Mary and Sam are gone playing (+ melting) with family in the midwest. I'm missing them terribly. But this is what I did.

I had a free "farm-to-family whole chicken" from Whole Foods, because of a grand opening coupon. Well, time was running out on the coupon and I couldn't wait for our little carnivore to return! I thought it was going to be a rotisserie chicken - but when I got to Whole Foods, it turned out to be a raw one.

OK, no problem - except I hadn't really planned on cooking. Quite frankly, the whole shopping trip became confused by this one thing. I didn't even remember milk! So I had to cook with what was already in the house.

But cooking is so much simpler than people make it out to be. It turns out 6 ingredients will really do the trick:

Chicken
Lemon
Garlic
Salt
Pepper
Olive Oil

I added some green beans on the side, a glass of Pinot Noir, an Oranje napkin (in celebration!) and some AL GREEN! How's that for lonely night perfection? Anyway, I couldn't share dinner with my loved ones tonight - but I know their digital selves will check in soon. Love you guys.

Why I'm supporting Bud's book

2010-06-28T18:45:00.000-07:00

I woke up Wednesday morning, fed the cats, fixed my coffee and started my morning read. This included a tweet from Bud Caddell -

I clicked the link and found out that Bud is writing a book and he's crowd-sourcing some funding + playing along with the process. I became a patron pretty soon after learning about the project.

Now, Bud has asked us to "Write a blog post, a tweet, or an email telling your friends and followers why you did it." I know enough about motivation and behavior on spending money and other decisions to figure I'll most likely think out some sort of post-rationalization for this answer if I try to give a clear argument. Let's just see what happens with rambling; it'll probably be more authentic.

1) Intuition - I went with my gut. In ~~2003~~ 2002 [Thanks bro! - always there to notice my mistakes!] after Jack Daniel's first global website went live (a project I invested quite some hours on), I sat in my apartment in Dallas and noticed I was quite fat. And not the good fat that I am now. A bad fat. A lazy, unhappy fat. My brother called me and told me I could move up to Chicago, live with him and serve food in the luxury boxes of Wrigley Field. My career path said that would be stupid. But my good friend, Pablo Ampuero said, "40 years from now are you likely to look back and go, 'Man, I'm glad I didn't work at Wrigley Field' or 'Man, I'm glad I worked at Wrigley Field?'" I quit my job shortly after that and moved to Chicago.

"Man, I'm glad I did not do that book project with Bud Caddell" or "Man, I'm glad I did that book project with Bud Caddell." Easy choice.

2) I've been looking for the mouse? - You can either read Clay Shirky's newest (last chapter) or read this speech to get a thorough idea. But basically, I'm done with passive media. I lost too much of my life to Three's Company. Watching Shirky's book come alive on twitter, blogs and videos was fun and engaging. But, I also like following my favorite comic book creators on twitter. Or hearing and exchanging comments about the voices of people whose words make me love this planet even more than I already do. Bud creates remarkable things, chances are the book will be remarkable. I would like to play in any way I am capable of playing.

3) Good Timing - I had actually just sent Bud a postcard of thanks the other day. I teach strategy at an art school. Not many people understand that. Despite being a strategy person, Bud is an artist - his aesthetic eye is wonderful (I constantly rip the images he finds for my presentations) + he makes groovy things. He also wrote a brilliant piece about getting a job in this field which I shared with all my classes the first week of summer. I had also noticed his activism with the Gulf oil spill and found out that he's from the Houston-area (where I was born) and went to UTexas (where I went for grad), so there was some common interest. Anyway, all this stuff made me go - this guy seems to be doing a lot of things I care about at the same time I care about them. I've been "stealing" from him, why don't I give back.

So, I did it. However, I ended up putting more money than my initial amount. For two reasons:

4) I saw a good friend (Heather) was also playing. I like playing with Heather (here are her reasons for being a patron - so I guess they are sort of mine too now.) It's easier to tell people you saw a unicorn when someone else says, "Look a unicorn!"

5) Bud had originally set it up that the project was going to be revenue-shared for the people who participated. This was a cool idea, but made it cloudy for me. Would people be extrinsically motivated by the project ... and could I feel good about recommending it, if I was tied to it making me money? However, that had to go away because of legal reasons (thankfully.) So, I became more interested.

OK, so that's why I did it in plain ramble. Underlying all of this, just like underlying all "marketing strategy is making money," is exchanging monetary capital for social capital. Somebody will read this post that has never read my blog before now or I'll connect in some other way through being a part of this book. And that person might make an offer to me, or one of my students, or a friend, or family member that makes the decision process go "am I going to look back and say:

Man, I'm glad I did this or I'm glad I didn't do this?" (BTW: If you are currently thinking, I don't want to look back and not have joined the fun - go join now!)

This for that.

2010-06-26T18:13:00.000-07:00

I am a pretty regular blood donor. Somewhere early in my life, I came to understand that it was part of my civic duty. Getting blood from people is an interesting study in motivation; I learned while reading Daniel Pink's Drive that people are more likely to give blood if they are doing it for altruistic reasons, rather than some sort of cash compensation. This makes sense. [Quick reminder: donate if you can - if you recently have, THANKS!]

A recent blood drive did catch my attention and got me donating. I got an email from the blood center that they were hosting a blood drive at Marin Brewing Company and that donors got a free lunch! I signed up immediately. By the way, I was WAY overdue - which is crazy since I should be doubly motivated now that Mary has had a transfusion.

So, I gave this (I donate double red so this video shows as the red coming out and then turning pink then clear as they are giving me back the other bits):

For that (Mt. Tam burger w/ rings):

Why did this work so well for me? After I give blood, one thing I'll be told is "Make sure your next meal is a hearty one." I use this "rule" as an excuse to get something like a big burger. Therefore, I dug this drive. I didn't feel like I was being compensated for my blood, as much as getting what I needed post blood donation.

This is an interesting idea to consider now that more people are doing and making more things for the love of it (amateurs) and we are all just helping it along. A little relevancy and consideration usually trumps additional compensation.

One thing that sucked: going to Marin Brewing and not being able to get a beer! See you tomorrow MBCo.

11 Incredible Letters

2010-06-24T09:53:00.000-07:00

I love this sign. I love it very much. One of the many afterlife options I'm hoping for includes me walking (well, if it's heaven let's say flying instead) ... so I fly into this room and there is this sign. And I do this.

I am embarrassed to say I took this picture yesterday on my first visit ever to City Lights Bookstore, the city's icon for evocative words. I promise it will not be 4 years until I go back. The location is at "the nexus of North Beach and Chinatown." Which is so fitting. Many people who visit SF comment on how bizarre it is to be walking among dried fish and hanging poultry and then cross the street and you are in front of a cute, authentic espresso bar. Inside the bookstore is the clash of cultures that we need to experience often to remind us of all the emotions swirling around this crowded island-planet.

I chose the following books for my first trip:
The Beats: A Graphic History - the store is obviously most well-known for the Beats and I love graphic storytelling. Done.

The Language of Saxophones: Selected Poems of Kamau Daaood - the obvious thing to do is get Ginsberg's HOWL. I will one day. But, I thought it was more important to get a book of poetry written by someone I didn't know and published by City Lights. Because that is what HOWL was, before it was HOWL.

Go find your words, and support the people that help get them out there.

Music meant to be SEEN and heard.

2010-06-21T07:01:00.000-07:00

Last night, Mary and I had the pleasure to attend a performance at the Tiburon Music Festival (her piano teacher is the festival director.) It is held in a relatively small church, St. Hilary's and we were able to get seats in the second pew. First, we heard a piano quintet by Schumann. It was followed by an Octet by Mendelssohn. And WOW.

All the performers (listed below) were San Francisco Symphony musicians with "Marin ties." To hear something that beautiful and complex, played passionately by world-class musicians in such an intimate setting is quite spectacular. Chamber music as it was meant to be seen and heard.

And that is the wonder of it all - music that is very specifically meant to be SEEN performed. In 1825, Mendelssohn (at the old age of 16) wrote this piece still many decades away from a device that could record this music and play it back. He intended us to sit and watch this music being made. Eight bows charging into the air, thirty-two strings vibrating, sixteen well-trained hands, so many notes on a page that it looked like spilled ink to a musical idiot like me: all of these come together to treat the eyes and add wonder to the sounds that fill your head.

As I sit here typing this with my headphones on my head, I pledge to more often watch music being made. Fortunately, I'm listening to My Morning Jacket who we'll be seeing in less than 2 months.

Go watch music.

Octet in E-Flat major, Op. 20 - Felix Mendelssohn.
Musicians (from left around circle)
Violins - Sarn Oliver, Amy Hiraga, Mariko Smiley, Chen Zhao
Cellos - Peter Wyrick, Barbara Bogatin
Violas - Nancy Ellis, Gina Feinauer

5/4 years ago

2010-06-20T07:11:00.000-07:00

5 years ago, Mary, Sam and I woke up in a tent next to a Lake Michigan beach. We got dressed and headed to the court house where a handful of people (whose names I can't recall) witnessed us becoming a "legal" family underneath a beautiful tree. We then took the most laborious dune hike of our lives. I gave Mary my heart, which she still has. I am so happy we made that decision.

The above picture is not from then. That picture is from a little less than 4 years ago. It was 4 years ago today that we crossed the California border in a U-Haul. That too was smart decision (well except taking the cats in the U-Haul...)

Happy family + California anniversary Mary and Sam. Happy lives!

2010-06-18T08:05:00.000-07:00

Mary and I just got new pocket cameras (the Canon PowerShot SD940 IS in case you are curious or want to get one.) This started when at graduation, I took a picture with Roland's camera and fell in love with it. At $200, it is quite a deal for a good, ultra-compact.

Anyway, Sam got the hand-me-down pocket camera (much better than the hand-me-down shorts I always got.) He is having a blast. He took more pictures yesterday than I probably took my entire first 12 years on this planet. I am so sorry for all the professional photographers suffering because of the boom in digital photography - but my joy for children taking more photos is thousands of times greater! Below is a sample of Sam's new perspective on life. It'll be interesting to watch what he captures.

Gardens Heal

2010-06-13T07:14:00.000-07:00

"How's Mary?"

Pick just about any reasonable adjective and that might be how she's doing at that particular time. Lots of ups and downs with this particular treatment.

But - when she is watering in Charlie's Magical Garden, she's happy. That much we can definitely say.

It ended with one tweet

2010-06-13T06:59:00.000-07:00

So, I ended the 30 Days of Creativity challenge and it only took one tweet from the "administrators."

I immediately tweeted back to them the T.S. Eliot quote: "When forced to work within a strict framework the imagination is taxed to its utmost – and will produce its richest ideas."

Create Stuff were well meaning in their intention of telling us that we didn't have to create something every day for 30 days - but that was the excitement of the challenge - that is what made it a challenge.

If you want to motivate people to create I recommend you check out Daniel Pink's Drive and Chip & Dan Heath's Switch before you start. I don't think they did.

Anyway, there is no need to reiterate the Pink + Heath brilliance here. But suffice it to say, the above tweet was like building a fence and then leaving the gate open. I walked out. When I first heard about this challenge, I was talking with someone about it. She happened to be from New York City and mentioned, "Maybe in Minnesota they have the time to do that, but not in New York!" This is a bit of a ridiculous statement - but I kind of understand it. (This is one of the reasons we'll eventually move to a cabin in Montana - take all the inspiration of an urban center, but go find the time to actually create somewhere else.)

But, there is SO much to do. SO many ways to spend time. SO many lovely things out there to interact with on a constant basis. However, I committed to do this challenge, and I'd find at least a couple of minutes to make it happen every day. But this one tweet basically said - Oh just create 30 things through the course of your lifetime? Wait what? I do create daily - I'm fortunate in having a job that allows that. But this challenge made me create something outside of that. Something above and beyond EVERY day.

OK, this is already more than I wanted to say. I just wanted to answer the question in case 40 years from now I look back and think that I was a quitter (maybe I'll pick up this challenge again then!)

Yes, those are bloody vermin entrails

2010-06-09T21:16:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty excited about this picture. The talon gripping the bloody mess exiting this rodent's body is pretty freaking cool.

I saw this hawk from the apartment. Unfortunately, we haven't got a nice camera yet ... all I had was the falling apart pocket camera, that could get this close:

Nice trees, but where's the hawk? I added the binoculars to the equation and was able to grab some fun shots.

Outside Lands just got even better

2010-06-09T21:05:00.000-07:00

Now I have a 6th song I'm really excited about hearing at Outside Lands.

Home (from Up from Below) by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. Fun!

#30daysofcreativity

2010-06-06T20:38:00.000-07:00

The other day, I got a challenge in my Twitter feed. Let me explain what happened chronologically:
1) Faris tweeted about the #30daysofcreativity project.
2) @createstuff decided someone at the #beersphere should take the challenge.
3) A minute later, they decided it should be me (probably figured they could get the art school guy).
4) I noticed this while walking to move my car in the midst of #beersphere. I rarely turn down a challenge. So ... here we go!

I take creativity to heart. I teach it. I like the Ken Robinson definition: the process of having original ideas that have value. So, walking on the street at the time of accepting this challenge, I started to think, "How can I add some value to the world right now." I immediately noticed all the cigarette butts littering the sidewalk. So I started picking them up. I decided to create a message of peace with them, take a quick phone camera shot, throw away the trash and head back to the beer + friends with my mission accomplished.

But then it was Day 2. A beautiful Saturday - and I had to put on a suit and host the AAU Spring Show from 9-5 in the city. Then when I came home, it was time for is to head to dinner and watch a band. We didn't return home until past 11pm. AHHHHH! Less than an hour to create. Quickly threw this together. It is actually a good story at why this challenge is an important one.

Today, I had a bit more time. Sam and I have been talking about creating this game called Riders for a while now. He and I sat down, got into a state of flow and created the spreadsheet below. I know it doesn't look very creative - but it is pretty kick-ass! We'll hopefully have more time this summer to keep playing with it!

Anyway - 10% there. Having fun. Looking forward to tomorrow! Keep an eye on Twitter or Flickr for updates. And check out all the great things people are creating!

UPDATE: I'll keep a Flickr Set of the projects.

"I'm not excited about the line-up"

2010-06-06T15:12:00.000-07:00

I've heard this over and over about the Outside Lands 2010 line-up. And quite frankly - I'm excited about that. Last year, I was very excited about the line-up. Beastie Boys had to cancel. Pearl Jam and Dave Matthews was less than perfect due to Festival idiots who tread on us and our space because they were so "excited." And then by the time we got to Band of Horses Sunday night - I was suffering sensory exhaustion. BUT, it was still an INCREDIBLE event. We loved it so much we had no problem jumping on Eager Beaver tickets!

Anyway, we're thrilled for the line-up - especially because it is full of a bunch of peeps we'd probably not go see if it weren't a festival.

If I hear these 5 songs - the tickets will have definitely paid for themselves (alphabetical by song title):

My brother Eric knows why this one is so important. Ball And Chain by Social Distortion

A classic, made more classic by Pulp Fiction. Let's Stay Together by Al Green

These guys are just darn good music fun. Lisztomania by Phoenix

Khaia showed me this video and my love for MMJ grew exponentially. Touch Me I'm Going To Scream Pt. 2 by My Morning Jacket

Got to love a good Cool Hand Luke homage ... and good harmony. When My Time Comes by Dawes

See you there!

Why I do things I "don't have time to do."

2010-06-06T10:22:00.000-07:00

[BTW: This post is not really for "Internet people" - more to explain why I am an Internet person to those who want to know. Well, it is mostly for future Cameron + progeny - like all of this blog.]

A few years ago, I was in a car with the president of the advertising agency that was my employer at the time. The subject of my blog came up. "I don't see how people have the time to do that?"

My first reaction of course was, "Oh shit - he thinks I'm a total loaf." Then I realized that I was sitting in his car, because he was driving me to help him win some important business (and most likely because I was part of that Internet tribe.) With that vanquished thought, the next thing to enter my brain was, "I don't know how you have the time NOT to do this?"

Utility is an important word in today's discussion about digital awesomeness. Utility in economics: the capacity of a commodity or a service to satisfy some human want. Early in my career, JWT had pounded into my head TIME IS THE NEW CURRENCY. Therefore, like many people - I think one of the best ways to create true utility is if you give people time back. In a world of so much abundance, time is the one thing that seems to disappear the most.

[I need to give a quick shout out to Clay Shirky, who in his book, Here Comes Everybody first got me to take this thinking from casual to applied pondering. There is a recent great WSJ piece by him + a new book which I will soon devour. Many props, sir.]

My digital self (now selves) gives me time back. [... and props to Kevin Slavin for getting me to be aware of the concept of the digital self, its multiplicity and the interaction with "real life."]

Here are a handful of ways:

1) My Flickr self - I sit through a lot of presentations. Every semester I have the pleasure of working with about 80 students I haven't taught until that time. My first presentation exercise is a pecha kucha; there are many reasons for this, but that is for a different post. This means about 1,600 visuals happen in pecha kucha week! First, it is remarkable how many students use the exact same image to express an idea. Second, stock photography is unremarkable in the digital age. My Flickr self has over 5,000 original visuals to support me (and given that my most recent uploaded pic was #4,674,091,838 on Flickr - it is quite a visual resource - shoot, just my silly Flickr alone will reach 100,000 views next month.)

My Flickr self saves me time on expressing myself in an interesting way.

2) My Twitter self - Mere hours before it happened, Twitter me saw Twitter Faris was looking to do a beer get together in San Francisco. And by golly, Twitter Gareth said he was joining in as well. These two gents have done a lot to convince everyone, from behemoth companies to young aspiring artists, to embrace digital loveliness. Despite sharing similar spheres - the two had yet to meet in person - just digital selves.

Trying to arrange a get together like this on such short notice without digital selves (especially on this particular day) would have been ridiculous. Several fun, like minded, incredibly busy, wonderful people gathered at the same place despite incredibly short notice and without an Infinite Improbability Drive. It is a grave misconception to think digital selves make us anti-social. The IRL (in real life) interactions that are created by the ease of digital selves are ridiculously abundant.

My Twitter self saves me time on meeting the people I would like to meet.

3) My foursquare self - Many people think this 4sqr thing is about the silly "slot-machine crossed with a dog marking its territory" aspect of mayorships and badges. But it isn't. Well, it is - but it is SO much more. It is about friends telling friends "what's what" about their community.

Joe and I went to Sol Food in San Rafael. While standing in line waiting to place our order, I suggested to Joe, "When they ask if you want salty or sweet plantains, say 'One of each.'" He then checked in on foursquare and got this tip. The whole idea is that you can leave tips for friends about what you'd say to them if you were there with them - that was EXACTLY what happened to us. Same thing happens with who you would introduce them to...

My foursquare self saves me time in connecting with my world.

Anyway, I could continue with Yelp self and Blog self and of course Facebook self - and selves tied to games and sports and retailers and interests, etc. But then you would get bored with Digital Cameron.

Just know if you are a person or parent who is wary of these digital selves:

A) There are lots of good reasons to be wary - so be informed and aware, but

B) These digital activities are very often about saving time not wasting it. (Trust me - as a person who spent hundreds of hours with Three's Company, I'm an expert on wasted time.)

C) Digital is not all about digital. It is about adding to the richness of life in its many forms.

OK - Carry on.

Happy Birthday Mary!

2010-06-02T21:13:00.000-07:00

Today is Mary's birthday!!

We had a nice day. She is still pretty beat from the treatment and all the drugs she continues to take. Therefore, I started the day with doing chores around the house so she could rest and play with her Facebook friends. (I was able to take the day off, because I'll be working Saturday 9-5 @ the Spring Show Open House for the school - please come say hi!)

The big treat of the day was that we had reservations for Chez Panisse Cafe this evening. I was fortunate enough to get the Thomas Keller experience earlier this year with my mom @ ad hoc. We are about to start our 5th year in the Bay Area, so it is about time we take advantage of the remarkable restaurateurs in the area. Tonight - it was Alice Waters.

YUM! You can check out the Flickr set, but the lighting was so poor that you only get a hint of how amazing the meal was.

We had a lovely booth right next to the open kitchen. They started us with sparkling water they carbonate on presence and some delicious rustic bread. Sam enjoyed the organic apple juice, Mary her D'Arbo black current soda and me my "H" Pinot Noir, Eric Hamacher, Willamette Valley.

To start, both Sam and I had the Louisiana shrimp and red pepper bisque with chervil (got to get them while you can!) and Mary had the Monterey Bay sardine toasts with radishes, celery, and capers. We also split a Little Gems lettuce with Chioggia beets, chives, and blue cheese dressing in between starters and entree.

For entrees, Sam had the grilled Elliott Ranch lamb leg with fava bean gratin, little carrots, and mint salsa, Mary had the sweet corn pudding souffle with morel mushrooms, spinach and peas, and I had the Liberty Farm duck leg cooked in the wood oven with frisee, grilled fennel, and tapenade.

For dessert, we split a Stracciatella ice cream with bittersweet chocolate almonds and a Lucero Farms strawberry and rhubarb shortcake with creme fraiche that they adorned with a sweet birthday message.

The meal was simply amazing. I could not stop saying Yum! Every bite was worth savoring. Without a doubt, the best duck I have EVER had (yes, Eric, even better than that stone age duck-gnawing we did in Baton Rouge!) Sam and Mary both loved the duck as well. (Sam says he was going to order it "next time we come.")

I'm just glad we were able to have a meal nourishing enough to give Mary the comfort she deserves right now, as well as remarkable and unique enough to express what a special person she is in my life. Happy Birthday, babe.

Update on Ms. Mary, love of my life.

2010-05-30T12:23:00.000-07:00

Hi there everyone,

Mary had put on her blog updates 1, 2 + 3 about this new treatment. Well, after a wonderful family wedding (Mary's comprehensive Flickr set) in which Mary got hit with the circulating stomach flu, we headed back to the hospital to start the treatment. It happened kind of last second, because Mary's phone was dead and we didn't know we were going in until the day of it all! Yes, Yosemite birthday fed to bone marrow biopsy fed to family wedding in Utah fed to end of semester fed to hospital time fed to Spring Party, Graduation and Spring Show at school. phew. I think we have some chances to take a breath or two now.

We went in on Monday for Mary to get her PICC line (the tube they put in your bloodstream all the way to near the heart so this intense drug wouldn't collapse her smaller blood vessels); fortunately, Mary had already had one of these - so no surprises.

Starting Tuesday morning, Mary started the ATG treatment (EQUINE) - yes, horse cells! She started this with benadryl, steroids, antibiotics and also another intense drug treatment: Ciclosporin. Let me give you an idea of what she is ingesting these days (yes, she is still taking many of these even though we are out of the hospital):

Oy. The ATG and Mary didn't get along at first. The dosage was too high (somewhere around 250ml/hr) and she broke out in serious hives on her face, back, chest, stomach, arms and thighs. It was a bit scary. They stopped the treatment, got her on more steroids and benadryl ... and she improved relatively quickly. I could go through the details, but I'll let Mary tell the story when and how she wants, but we got her down on the rate of dosage and were able to complete the ATG by late Friday night (tecnically, Saturday morning.)

Relative to the last hospital visit, this one was uneventful and bearable.

We had a pizza party, a Sam visit, played cards and enjoyed our story about owls! (Movie prep.)

We busted out Saturday around noon with bags full of drugs. Sam did remarkable, even spending a night by himself! We actually haven't seen him much as he continues to be enjoying time with friends, including the Giants game today. He's doing great though - we at least got to feed our little carnivore once.

Mary's dealing with the effects of having such intense things done to her immune system, but how much better is Mary feeling this time compared to last? We went kayaking in Sausalito this morning!

Woo-Hoo! Let summer begin!

Heading to the hospital again

2010-05-24T13:47:00.001-07:00

Flowers from our garden., originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

I just want to make sure everyone is aware of the latest. Mary discussed on her blog about a new treatment. Well, it looks like that treatment is going to start today - we are headed to the hospital in a couple of minutes here and she'll probably be there until Friday. So please excuse our scatterbrains and lack of response. We love you very much - just preoccupied and more focused on finding pockets of peace right now.

For those who want to send flowers - instead go outside, take a beautiful picture of some flowers and then email it to Mary (we probably will be under the neutropenic guidelines of no fresh plants of any type - Nothing speaks health like that!)

Your friends,
Cam, Mary & Sam

Semester's end

2010-05-23T06:43:00.001-07:00

The road back, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

Hi all,

So the semester ended and it was a busy, busy time to the end. Most semesters end with me being ill, but given Mary's compromised immune system, my body decided to manifest the end of this semester stress in the form of serious lower back pain.

I'll get back to blogging as soon as I'm back to breathing and walking like a normal person again!

Cam

Heading to the hospital

2010-05-07T09:55:00.001-07:00

Osso Bucco $8.00, originally uploaded by ayngelina.

For the non-Facebook followers, Mary and I are heading to the hospital in a couple of minutes for her to have another bone marrow biopsy (the ghouls demand their Osso Bucco). It is a baseline and we aren't really "looking for anything bad" - just taking a peek before we start the new treatments outlined on Mary's blog. Anyway - warm thoughts are much appreciated. This is not a fun procedure.

Thanks to all the students who let me skip out on them today so I can hold her hand throughout the procedure. You are much appreciated.

Cam

The first blog post from a 35 year old.

2010-05-03T19:52:00.000-07:00

So, we did manage to make it out to Yosemite this past weekend. We ended up doing almost NO prep leading up to leaving- but we had some yummy Joe's Taco Lounge and a nice Birthday tiramisu (with "Happy Birthday" piano accompaniment) for my birthday Thursday night. Friday morning, I got everything together and Mary gave a nice update on her blog about the latest on her health - we are going to be trying out a new treatment:
1) Recap
2) Death Star
3) X-Wing

Our trip was AMAZING! The Mist Trail was closed because of the weather, but it ended up giving us the chance to explore other things. Our campsite was lovely and mostly quiet. We slept fairly well every night. Our first day we hiked from the campsite up to Vernal Falls bridge (and a bit beyond) back to the stables and then on to Mirror Lake and Yosemite Falls. The second day was a 10-mile hike around the Valley from Camp 4 past El Captain to Poho Bridge and back, with an exciting crossing of Ribbon Creek and a Bridalveil Fall viewing. The next morning we got up and out of the site in no time. 4 hours later, back at home. I got the Flickr set up - because things get pretty busy for the next 4 weeks or so! (Please excuse typos here and Flickr set ... just trying to get this stuff up.)

Waterfalls - here we come?

2010-04-26T07:25:00.000-07:00

Woo-Hoo! Weather prediction's improving... Chilly nights in the tent - maybe we can bring the cats to snuggle??

Change of plans?

2010-04-24T07:05:00.000-07:00

The current plan is to celebrate my 35th birthday this weekend @ Yosemite - camping on the Valley floor and enjoying the "moonbow" and waterfalls a la 2007.

The current plan may be changing given the recent weather reports... Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Listening bird

2010-04-12T11:38:00.000-07:00

This morning Mary practiced some new pieces she just got in her piano classes. A little bird listened. The bird flitted around our tiny garden. Playing with the music.

Eventually, the bird moved to the chairs, where the piano-playing view was better.

Birds and piano music are a nice peaceful start to the Monday morning.

5 reasons that Giants game rocked!

2010-04-11T22:04:00.000-07:00

Mary and I just got back from the Giants game today. Here are the top 5 reasons why that game rocked!

1) Beer and garlic fries. This makes every Giants game worth going to, no matter what. (Thanks Mary for getting them.)

2) Tim Lincecum. Seriously, it is a privilege to watch that guy pitch. 10 strikeouts - all of them swinging - including his last 3 outs. (He also helped me lock up some categories for my troubled fantasy team.)

3) The weather. It was so bizarre. It really didn't feel like we were getting a game in today. We hung out at the house all day, but then suddenly, it looked like a patch was going to open up so we headed out to the park. The rain stopped - the game started - a little rain made us wonder if it could keep up. But then the sun peeked out. Mary spotted a rainbow - it was glorious. Remarkably, when Matt Diaz took the final swinging strike of the game (which as Mary pointed out was fitting because he got razzed for pausing the game to get his sunglasses delivered and then dropped a fly in the wind later), it looked like he ripped the sky open with his bat as the rain came pouring down just as the Giants won!

4) Those shots. Got to see Brian McCann hit a BIG shot into the SERIOUS wind of right field, where I (and the radio announcers, I later discovered) predicted no home run would head. Lincecum obviously wasn't set yet - his only walk followed by his only mistake. That's what only 10-minutes of warm-up will do. Got to see Jason Heyward hit his 3rd career home run - he has a lot more in him. Wow that kid is going to be something. Got to see Mark DeRosa continue that clutch hitting that made him so popular in Chicago and will make him popular here, too.

And then there was Panda. One of the things I did this year to get me more excited about the Giants was draft a hitter - so I took their best - Pablo Sandoval. He made 3 clutch hits, all three leading to runs. The first was a hustling 2-out triple, the second was the start of the 2-out rally DeRosa made count, and the third was a MAMMOTH shot into the wind. It would have landed in McCovey Cove if not for the forcing wind driving right into the park ... POWER. He also hustles when it's time to get an out. He's the type of player that is going to help me get interested in this team. (Ironically, his monster day at the plate was too little, too late for my anemic fantasy team offense this week.)

5) The best life partner in the world. I am very lucky.

Poland

2010-04-10T08:54:00.001-07:00

raindrops, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

My heart goes out to Poland. What a heavy day for this world.

I am trying to decide what class to take this summer

2010-03-31T11:13:00.001-07:00

illustration from A Head for Happy by Helen Sewell, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

This image from Curious Pages - recommended inappropriate books for kids is definitely steering me towards drawing...

A kid's mind

2010-03-27T18:42:00.000-07:00

Like Hugh MacLeod, I too found drawing on business cards to be fun and an appropriate channel for my creativity (except I lacked talent.) The above art is how I dealt with the emotions of the passing of our cat Timothy on the back of my mom's business card.

My mom (in addition to pictures) brought some old writings and other things I created as a child. Including:
Charts about how I viewed myself (I found myself to be quite remarkable!) - bar graph and more abstract.
Poems - a night scare and EYES
Letters - one that sounds like it was written on coke (but wasn't) about a night with friends, postcards showing my commitment to reading + nature at a young age, the night of my ONLY moving violation ticket, a cat on a heart talking about the "wrong situations" in my life, and a strange 2-page note declaring how well I was doing - when I was actually doing quite bad - about to fail 10th grade.
and a few other things if you want to check them out.

Time ago

2010-03-27T18:26:00.000-07:00

With my mom coming to visit, she brought some old photos from Philip Gould (who also took the picture of me with the umbrella in the blog's header). I scanned them (with my crappy scanner) and put them on Flickr - from those of you who love the Old School stuff. The above pic makes it look like Eric and I enjoyed each other's company - it wouldn't be for another 12 years or so before we actually did.

Everyday and Tedious

2010-03-25T13:01:00.000-07:00

I am so excited that I will get to watch the meaning of the words TEDIOUS and EVERYDAY shift dramatically in the course of my lifetime.

Everyday... Every Day we see something that amazes us ... if we choose.

Tedious ... we are training this machine to do the tedious, more and more.

Fun to be alive.

The less healthcare is tied to the workplace

2010-03-25T12:45:00.000-07:00

the fewer jobs like this we'll have!

Song misheard

2010-03-23T20:37:00.001-07:00

awaiting taxidermy, originally uploaded by Foxtongue.

Song: "Paradise"
Sam: "Wait what? Ferret Dies?"
Mary: "Paradise."
Sam: "Oh, I thought she said 'Ferret Dies' and I was like 'What?'"

Michael Curry

2010-03-22T09:02:00.001-07:00

Michael and Cameron, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux Photo taken by Philip Gould.

Wonderful friend, Michael Curry recently scared us a bit with a Heart-Health issue. He is doing better, resting at home and we are all sending him bunches of love.

He may be one of “50 Very Important People Shaping Life in Hampton Roads” - he is definitely in my Top 10 of VIP who shaped me into who I became. Thanks for the thousandth time, Michael.