Archive for category Personal

New Ink: I had an itch, so I scratched it.

Posted by Jason / Admin on Tuesday, 9 February, 2010

It is true what they say; tattoos are addictive. Ever since my first ink back in February 1996, I’ve been constantly planning the next pieces I’ll get, always looking at least 3 designs in the future. Each design has shifted and changed as I have, up to the point where it is the perfect piece at the perfect time to have it set in ink. All my tattoos have been years in the making from concept to execution. And last night’s session at Adorn Body Art was no different.

For the past two year, I’d been contemplating a few concepts for more tattoos loosely based around how my life has changed since we left California and moved to Oregon. Part of that concept was realized in my Craftsman/Mission style number 13 house plague in black and gray on my upper inner forearm. For me, this was a great realization of the work Jean and I have done on our new home, as well as a celebration of 13 years of marriage (anniversary date is July 13th). But something about it left me wanting… it felt somehow incomplete, as if it needed more balance. So, I opted to add in another design I had been thinking about for the past two years: an Arts & Crafts stained glass design called the “Pasadena Rose”.

Both Jean and I fell in love with the design immediately after installing the two wall sconces which incorporate it in our living room. For me, the design connects the dots of our move from Southern California, to the “Rose City” of Portland. It also displays my love for the Arts&Crafts / Mission / Craftsman design movements which are popular in both  SoCal and Portland.

Like all my tattoos, this one has a deeper connection and meaning for me than I can adequately convey in plain words. The best way I can describe it is this: tattoos for me are stamps on the steamer trunk of my body; they tell the tale of my life in iconic form.

In this latest case, it is the stained glass “Pasadena Rose” on my forearm:

Click the picture for the larger view

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Lastly, here is my Picasa gallery showing some of the tattoo work I’ve had done: http://picasaweb.google.com/acdntlpoet/Tattoos?feat=directlink

More work can be seen on the WaywardCelt gallery here: http://waywardcelt.com/coppermine/thumbnails.php?album=16

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The power of the interwebs on one man’s happiness

Posted by Jason / Admin on Friday, 18 December, 2009

As many of you know, my dad has been painting watercolours for a number of years now as his passion. He’d been drawing professionally all his life, but only in retirement did he seriously tackle watercolours as his focal media. After showing quite well in a few juried competitions and art shows, and being asked numerous times if he was in a gallery or on the web, he came to me to discuss building a website. So, a few years back, I built out a site and surprised him for his birthday; since then, I’ve rebuilt and maintained his site as a birthday present since it isn’t a necessity for him, and being retired I figured it is an expense he didn’t need to shell out.

While I know the value of a website, it seems dad just figured out exactly what it can do for him. About two months ago he was contacted by a gentleman who had found dad on his website and indicated he was interested in purchasing one of his paintings. They communicated a few times, and finally met up yesterday for a private viewing of a few of dad’s paintings. Dad walked away from that viewing having sold three of his largest paintings for a few thousand dollars each. He called to tell me the news within minutes of arriving home. Rarely have I heard dad so giddy, but I guess a bit of a financial windfall like that will perk anyone’s spirits, especially right before the holiday.

You want to make a retired painter happy? I think I finally found the formula… it involves patience, talent, and a whole lot of luck.  Merry Christmas, dad.

Lastly, for those of you who haven’t seen his work before, go ahead and click on over to www.ODonnellMarineArt.com
I think you’ll enjoy what you see there… though I am indeed biased of course; not only because he raised me, but because I also own four of his originals. And no, mine aren’t for sale  ;)

The Great Western roadtrip (or how I learned to stop thinking and love the war)

Posted by Jason / Admin on Thursday, 15 October, 2009

Ok, so this is how my ‘vacation’ went:

Right off the bat, let me say that the time spent at war with friends was well worth the effort…. I had not been looking forward to this war as I had others. No sense of excitement for the tasting was washing over me, nor was I looking towards the 1700+mile roundtrip to get there and back. It wasn’t until the Sunday before when I figured I was committed to it, since that was when I had packed my bike in preparation. And it wasn’t until Tuesday before that I was 100% sure I was going…

Click the link below for the full story… Be warned, this post is as long as the 1700 miles I rode to make it.

And now for something completely different…

Posted by Jason / Admin on Tuesday, 10 March, 2009

As promised, pics of the new cut, behind the cut, like a good little emo kid:

A direct link to the Picasa album is here.

Enjoy.

It is kinda like my hearse…

Posted by Jason / Admin on Monday, 9 March, 2009

… in that I’ve always wanted one, and realized I can have one now. So I did.

Since I work from home, and rarely leave the house, I figured a haircut really didn’t matter. So, I let it go far too long for my own taste and didn’t see a barber for over 3.5 months. I got a bit shaggy. And then I realized, when I get it cut, I can do anything I want.

I’ve been a bit antsy anyways, and looking for a good change to shake things up a bit. So yesterday Jean and I headed out for a day downtown. We ended up at Bishops barber shop at around 3pm and I sat for about half an hour while Danica clipped away at my head.

End result: mohawk.

Later, Jean and I ended up at Alteration Nation to pickup some hair dye. After all, what is a mohawk without proper colour? We walked out of there with a t-shirt, vintage velvet coat, and some violet wildflower Special Effects dye to give a dark purple/blue hue to my head.

Sadly, the dye didn’t take well last night, so we’ll be bleaching and redying tonight, after which I expect to fan it up and get some decent pictures for you all (since I know you are on the edge of your seat with antici-… wait for it… -pation).

Good times. And yes, I AM straining to keep a hold of my rebellious youth, thankyouverymuch. \m/

Welcome to America…

Posted by Jason / Admin on Monday, 2 February, 2009

Where social and political satire is a four letter word:

http://www.tshirthell.com/goodbye.php

In excerpt: “I’m done. I’m finished. I can’t take the stupidity anymore, so I’m leaving and I’m taking my website with me. As of Tuesday, Feb 10, 2009, T-Shirt Hell will be no more.”

Go on and read the whole good-bye… I’ll wait…

Back? Good.
Seriously, if it weren’t for the fact that T-Shirt Hell is willfully going off line only because of the inability to deal with the growing level of stupidity in America, I’d be inclined to post a much more inflammatory and vitriolic diatribe on the misconception of “free-speech”. Not one where I go off on people who think T-Shirt Hell is supported by free speech, but rather how speech, though technically protected, is much less free than we all think it is. But I won’t go down that path since the only thing bringing down T-Shirt Hell is pure unabashed impatience with the glass-licking majority of America that can’t distinguish satire from hate speech. And really, who DOES have that much patience?

Sure, the shirts they produce are offensive to some. That’s the whole point. And yes, I CAN see how some of the shirts could be misunderstood or confused as serious in their statements. That said, come on people! Stop and laugh at yourselves. See the bigger picture and your place in it. Besides, mocking others in such a way is not only satirical, it is down right sardonic. And THAT, my friends, is made of pure unadulterated WIN.

Why not… it is amusing and oddly accurate:

Posted by Jason / Admin on Tuesday, 20 January, 2009

Jason’s Dewey Decimal Section:
042 [Unassigned]

Class:
000 Computer Science, Information & General Works

Contains:
Encyclopedias, magazines, journals and books with quotations.

What it says about you:
You are very informative and up to date. You’re working on living in the here and now, not the past. You go through a lot of changes. When you make a decision you can be very sure of yourself, maybe even stubborn, but your friends appreciate your honesty and resolve.

Find your Dewey Decimal Section at Spacefem.com

The opposite of 20 Questions…

Posted by Jason / Admin on Monday, 5 January, 2009

I give you 20 Answers:

The ‘rules’ are, once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with any number random things, facts, habits or goals about you. At the end choose people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. I don’t like these ‘rules’, so if you are reading and choose to continue this, please do so. I’d love to read what you have to say…

1. I generally live in the moment and find lists like this difficult because I have trouble remembering things from my past which may be relevant. My thoughts are typically revolving around “now” or “soon”.

2. I commuted on my motorcycle as my primary mode of transportation with my hearse as a backup car when needed. After moving to Portland and working from home, I never drove the hearse and rarely rode the bike, so I sold the hearse. Now my only form of transportation is my motorcycle, and my wife’s car when she isn’t at work.

3. I rode my motorcycle 1000 miles in 18.5 hours from Orange County to Portland, OR. to try and get my “Saddle Sore 1k” certification, but fell short on my receipt paperwork to confirm it by 15 miles, even though my odometer showed we had traveled 1003 miles. I never got the confirmation, but I know I did it, and my body knew I did it too.

4. In high school psychology class, I learned about self actualization and thought I fit the criteria. To this day I have no clue what I was thinking and find myself to be less and less actualized as time progresses.

5. In November I started and completed a 50,000 word fiction novel, not a word of which will ever see the light of day. In re-reading the narrative I came to realize I am not a fiction novelist. Releasing it into the wild, even after extensive editing, would only prove to everyone else the same thing. I’d prefer people to think of me as if I could indeed write well.

6. Despite all efforts to the contrary, I do care deeply about how people think of me.

7. Though Colleen will disagree, I do not have a secret love for New Kids on the Block. I do, however, have a not-so-secret love for Justin Timberlake’s music, as well as Missy Elliot, Pink, Gwen Steffani, Busta Rhymes, any pop-song covers played by punk bands, and to my wife’s dismay, Rockapella.

8. Moving out of Southern California to a suburb of Portland Oregon was simultaneously the worst and best thing I have ever done. I am a much happier person now, but deeply miss all the friends we left behind.

9. I have a deep-seeded belief that Alton Brown stole my dream life when he took his food show on the road via his BMW GS motorcycle, road cross country eating at roadside diners, and getting paid to film it and subsequently write a recipe book afterwards. Given the resources, I would do the same thing, sans having my own TV show.

10. After 10+ years of working in a technical support capacity, I cringe every time the phone rings. I rarely pick it up, and if I do, my calls tend to be much shorter than earlier in life. This is directly related to the fact that I am much more well spoken through the written word than verbal communications. Writing allows me to collect my thoughts and organize the words to my preference. Speaking just allows me to sounds stupid.

11. I despise television, but it is the one thing outside of work that occupies the majority of my time. Watching tv allows me to turn my mind off and decompress in a way that if I did so during any activy hobby would result in catastrophic injury.

12. I can go for at least 6 days without stepping a foot outside of my house. Make it impossible for me to leave, however, and cabin fever sets in within hours. Allow me to leave, and I’ll stay inside for days/weeks on end.

13. Years ago I worked for an internet content filtering company (parental control type software) as a Verification Specialist; this required me to visually identify block-able material to ensure we did not block sites that were “legitimate”. This translates to me surfing for porn for a living for a year. I have not been the same since this job.

14. When I started the ‘porn surfing’ job, I was also doing market research for a company that was providing me with a 12 pack of beer a week in order to consume and rate my opinion, for which I was monetarily compensated. The beer was by far better than the porn.

15. I am a grammar and spelling Nazi, and tend to make snap judgments about people if my first impression upon meeting them is in the form of a poorly worded or misspelled forum posting/email, etc. At the same time, I am one of the worst offenders in both categories. I dislike in others that which I see in myself.

16. I rampantly abuse ellipses to intone pauses within my casual writing…

17. LOLCats are disturbingly fascinating to me, regardless (and because) of the flagrant disregard for the Queen’s English. My wife and I have been known to speak in LOLCat for entire days; whilst laughing hysterically of course.

18. I lack that part of the brain that makes people have children. Neither Jean nor I have any maternal/paternal instincts and are quite happy being child-free. I also lack the genetic code that makes all men love sports; I couldn’t care less about watching any sporting event, let alone following any particular sport team, etc.

19. As much as I’d love to be the creative type, I can not create something from nothing. I am much better at refining someone else’s ideas than having any original idea of my own.

20. It took me 3 days to build this list after being tagged in Raz’ list. Proof positive of item number 1 I’d say.

The Great PDX snow-in of 2008

Posted by Jason / Admin on Sunday, 21 December, 2008

Ok… thus far we have received 10 inches of snow, and the forecast is calling for another 7+ by the end of tonight. Temps have been hovering in the low 20’s for the past week or so…. this is unheard of for this area!!!! We’re typically in the 30s for the lows and upper 40s for the highs this time of year, and -maybe- with an inch or less of snow that only sticks for a day. We’re going on a week of this now, and it doesn’t sound like it will be melting off for another week…

We’re doing fine; though Jean is missing a bit of work because of it. We can walk to our local grocer so we’re stocked up and able to get things if needed.

That said, here are some pictures; http://picasaweb.google.com/acdntlpoet/SnowStormDec2008#

Audiophile Amusements

Posted by Jason / Admin on Wednesday, 12 November, 2008

1. Put your iTunes/mp3 player on shuffle.

2. For each question, press the next button to get your answer.

Audio Answers meme for your amusement while I procrastinate on actual writing. Enjoy