My Dog Cheese (AKA Google Self-Worth)

If you google "cheese", you get a million hits about cheese. If you google "cheese dog" you get a million hits and pictures about chili cheese dogs and a few about how dogs like cheese.

My dog's name is Cheese and this is my attempt to get her moving up the google search ranks under "Cheese". When people think "Cheese" I want them thinking about my crazy ass canine companion rather than a chunk of rotting dairy.

Skinny Love: Your music moment of the day

For Friday, just a great song and another great piece from the folks over at The Blogotheque.
Bon Iver - Skinny Love

Hope And Change (AKA The Audacity Of Art)

I recently stumbled upon this artist named Travis Louie. His paintings of Victorian era monsters and chimeras are indelibly haunting. The style of those old, hazy portraits which he draws upon pulls you in like a living fog, and you find yourself wading deeper into melancholy. You recognize that as alive as you are this very moment, one day you too will be a thing left to a distant past; a photograph, a DVD collection, a dusty blog stumbled upon by a Tom Sawyer and a Huck Finn who marvel at it for a few moments until a frog croaks and their chase of life and wonder begins again.

I'm impressed at how quickly the artist is able to make you see past the monsters and through to the life within them. Like us, even monsters need to remember. Like us, even monsters want to stop time. Like us, even monsters have an innate and subconscious understanding that memory is not an inert thing like a photograph or a letter; memory is an act of creation. But there are times where we need that memorabilia. To call upon it as a guide when we've gotten turned around in the back roads we've traveled thousands of times, catching frogs, playing make believe.

I would love to see these works in person because it's almost hard to believe they are actual paintings and not digital images.

Please visit his website here.

Dry Drowning. The Possible Impossible.

I couldn't have even imagined this possible:

Johnny Jackson, a 10-year-old American boy from South Carolina, died at home on Sunday from "dry drowning" more than an hour after going swimming and walking home with his mother. The sad event highlights a little known danger that parents and child carers should be aware of, that drowning can kill hours after being submersed in water.

Johnny's mother, Cassandra Jackson, told NBC News in a story broadcast on the TODAY show on Thursday that:

"I've never known a child could walk around, talk, speak and their lungs be filled with water."

Johnny must have got some water in his lungs while he was swimming in his local pool at Goose Greek, South Carolina. He didn't show any signs of respiratory distress, but he had an accident in the pool and "soiled himself", said the TODAY report. He then walked home with his mother and sister.

His mother said she bathed him and he told her he felt sleepy. When she went to check on him later she saw his face was covered in a "spongy white material". He was rushed to hospital but it was too late.

Pictures In Motion

Go over to McSweeney's, where you'll find an amazing article from 1896 where a man reports on his first time seeing a movie. Fascinating.

Get Smart

The man who says he is willing to meet you halfway is usually a poor judge of distance.

Lawrence J. Peter

Christian The Lion (AKA Your Warm Fuzzy Feeling Of The Day)

Out Of This World

A sunset on Mars. Thanks, NASA.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

It's over.

Senator Obama's nomination was well earned. His campaign platform of change has already followed through on that promise. Not only is he the first black Presidential candidate in history, but more importantly, he has already managed to elevate the level of politics in America. That is profound change for any government, and this was only a primary.

When faced with the issue of Reverend Wright, he took the path no other candidate would have even considered viable; he didn't hide from it, or try to find the perfect ten word sound byte - no, instead he gave his now historic speech on race. A 40 minute speech that was mature and complex. A 40 minute speech in a time when polls and market research tells us that the public can't watch a news item that is longer than 2 minutes. He spoke to the nation as if they were adults and not merely a focus group. And they in turn responded as such.

That is good politics. That is why I am certain he will win the Presidency. That is why I am very hopeful he may achieve some great things in his time in office. Getting things done in Washington is getting things done through politics, and Senator Obama is very, very good at politics. Having that ability, coupled with fortuitous timing, is what enables the chosen few to make real history.

I hope for the best and now have only these words of advice for him, which I have taken from Bill Strickland:

"You must be prepared to act on your dreams, just in case they do come true".