Another video! But who does not love flip books?!

The human flip book:

How Much Do I Love This Man?

John Cusack proves once again that he is, in fact, the perfect man: Witty, sharp, and socially conscious. All that, and those beautiful, beautiful eyes.

Jenny Owen Youngs does Nelly.... covers that is

The song is Hot in Herre.
I love when folky pop people cover rap songs. Jill Sobule did it when she performed at USM a few years ago and it rocked my socks.

I want to bake this man dozens of cookies

San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders spoke out in favor of gay marriage, and said that he would not veto a resolution to support same sex marriage. Previously, he had been expected to.

Appalachian Poster Child

This is a billboard I pass on my way to any of the more fun cities 'round these parts. My only question: Is this really the best image they could come up with to sell ceramic tile?

Creation Schmeation, Religion is Scary: Jen's Day at the Creation Museum

Yesterday, Dave and I went to the 27-million dollar Creation Museum. Why? Because I'm all about religious mysteries these days, and the most mysterious of them all is who in the world actually believes that the earth is only six thousand years old. I wasn't actually surprised by the quality of the displays; I grew up in a crazy-ass Pentecostal church, I know all about the power of fundamentalist showmanship. Plus I'd read some articles and some reviews, so... Yeah. I knew that there was a born-again Disney guy who'd personally done the animatronics, and that there was a Garden of Eden and part of a life-sized replica of Noah's Ark.

So what was the surprise, you may ask? The surprise was the number of people there. On a Tuesday in September, there were bevies of old folk, Amish folk, teen folk with "I Heart Jesus" t-shirts, couples with babies... Holy Moses, what's going on with the world? According to the affable older archaeologist man (think of him as the Anti-Giles) featured on the many video "documentaries," creationism is indeed a science. It seems that if you just base all of your beliefs on the COMPLETELY UNFOUNDED notion that there was a worldwide flood back in the day, that explains why everything - fossils, the earth's crust, our apey non-ancestors - look so doggone old.

The first stop in the tour is a realistic rendering of an archaeological dig, complete with two waxy figures digging up waxy bones. Anti-Giles narrates from a widescreen, flat panel TV above. Anti-Giles is also involved in an archaeological dig, with a swarthy, vaguely inept fellow explorer. It seems his companion doesn't actually believe in creationism, and proceeds to give a stumbling, bumbling explanation of why evolution makes more sense. Then AG smoothly intercedes, to tell us why he believes that creationism is totally the way to go. It seems that it's all about the Flood - the one God sent down because he was pissed at how crappy people were. You know the story: Noah and two of every animal on this huge boat and it rained for forty days and forty nights, yada yada yada. Anyway, the result of this monstrous natural disaster was that it screwed up the world's climate, plunged us into an ice age, sped up sedimentation rates, and generally just made things look... well, really, really, really old.

From that convincing scientific argument, we make our way to the Graffiti Alley (aka the Tunnel of Shame), with graffiti and a magazine clipping collage showing the decline of western civilization. Most of it has to do with homosexuality, of course, but then there are a few fun snippets about plastic surgery (vanity, I guess, is what they're getting at there), stem cell research, school shootings, and all those other crappy things in our lives. Then you go through the tunnel itself, which flashes violent black and white images on the wall while somebody screams and there's somebody else crying and some random guy tells us why the world is such a shitty place.

Then you through another alley to get to Culture in Crisis, which features a bunch of dastardly home scenes - one with a renegade teen downloading Internet porn (you can't see the porn, so I'm just going on the creepy faces he's making) and some poor knocked up girl trying to schedule an abortion. There's also a vignette of a gossipy woman and her gossipy best friend talking in hushed tones while her husband drinks beer and watches TV in the background. I thought at first that the problem was the gossiping, but it turns out hubby's a druggie who won't get a job. There's also a statistic saying that one in five women in the U.S. has sex before they're married, and I was totally like, "Seriously? It's gotta be more than that." Don't you think? One in five... I think three of those five are total liars.

Anyway, from there we're finally allowed into the Garden of Eden. Eden, incidentally - totally cool. The guy they modeled the animatronic Adam after is actually a porn star (or so the rumor goes), so he's very swarthy and muscular and, I imagine, well endowed. Creationist Adam has no penis parts, so that's all my imagination talking there. Adam and Eve have a rockin' life, and then all hell breaks loose when Eve makes Adam take a bite out of the famed Apple of Satan. Cain kills Abel, there's a frankly horrific display of Adam and Eve standing over the skinned corpses of two unidentifiable animals, and I can just imagine the number of screwed up Bible beater children who'll be haunted by these images for years to come.

From there we get to meet Methuselah, the oldest man ever. 969 years old, was Methuselah. He looks a lot like Yoda, and kind of sounds like him. Apparently Methuselah spawned Noah, because then we head right on over to the Ark. Which also rocks. There are lots of animals, and movies, and scale models, and you actually wander around a structure that is allegedly the size of 1% of the actual Ark. There are lots of little teeny animal figurines and fun shadow boxes, one of which contains swarthy Bible people sitting around a table having dinner. There are an equal number of men and women, just to make sure we know there was no funny stuff going on on the ark (of course, most of these men and women were siblings, but that's clearly not an issue).

Then we head over to the crucifixion, and a twenty minute feature film starring - you guessed it - our good friend Anti-Giles. There are a lot of gruesome dramatizations of animal sacrifices and the crucifixion itself, and a telling interview with Mary. Once you've survived the crucifixion, you get to go outside and enjoy the Creation Gardens, which are still under construction but promise to be very, very cool.

So my general impression of the Creation Museum? Nicely presented, well organized, and completely terrifying. That parents who actually believe this bunk are allowed to bring their kids, and present all of this to them as truth... Well, the whole thing seems a little nuts to me. According to a recent ABC news poll, up to 60-percent of the country believes that the world was created in six days. Sixty percent! People are completely gullible. I do, however, admire the whole spin the authors of the Bible took way back when: If you don't buy my book (both literally and figuratively), you'll burn in hell forever and ever. It's not subtle, but it's clearly effective. I'm planning on using the same strategy with my next novel.

Seth Green brilliance

Torrey had posted the original Chris Crocker video. (Crocker by the way, is like a non-lethal car wreck to me -- I just can't help myself and I have to watch. I am horrified. He is like a really good episode of Springer. He grounds me.) So here is Seth Green's take on it. Oh man, this Whedon alum keeps on getting better and better.

Oh, and yes, I had to find a way to work Whedon in there somehow. It had been a while.

Seven things I am looking forward to my fall travel season

1. Traveling New England in the fall. And especially some of my favorite places like Burlington and Northampton.
2. Not making my bed.
3. Alone time -- on some days it does get to me -- but over all, I love the being in the car and just getting lost in my head. I need to bring my tape recorder this time.
4. People watching. Especially at restaurants. I make up little stories about them. Beware the person who sits alone at a restaurant.
   
5. A car with a CD player! And if that wasn't a great hint for you to make me a mix before I hit the road.....
   
6. Not being in the office!
7. Seeing some friends when I travel. Its nice after being solo for that long, to see someone and have it feel homey. It anchors the two transient months I spend out there.

I hit the road Monday for two months to visit high schools and college fairs all over Vermont, Central NH, Western MA, New York, and midcoast Maine. I am so excited to go. The stability of an office is nice, but oh man... get me out of there!

Maine Youth Leadership

Once again, I adore these people.



And if you want to give a little back -- use Good Search as your search engine powered by Yahoo. Select Maine Youth Leadership for the organization for your searching to be credited to. We get a penny for every search. It adds up after a while! Or you could just give us wads of cash... really either would be accepted.

Greetings from the Long Lost Not Done Baking Partner

Hey Ho Not Done Baking-ites,

Jen here, the long-lost other half of Not Done Baking. When Sara started Not Done Baking back in the day, we had this great idea that we'd collaborate and it would be tremendous fun for everyone involved... Except that slacker that I am, I never actually posted and Sara ran with the idea like the True Creative Genius that we all know she is. And now sixteen years later, I mentioned the wonder of blogging whilst on the phone with our lady Sara the other day and she said, "Hey, you should post on Not Done Baking again." And I said, "Okay," and that was that. Not the most scintillating dialogue, true, but nevertheless, that's the way it went. In case you were wondering who the hell I am and why the hell I'm writing on Sara's blog; now you know.

I'm writing this from sunny Kentucky, where the grass is not blue and the people really love Jesus. A LOT. At the moment I live in a former elementary school with about ninety animals - who knows how long that'll be the case, but for now let's just revel in the absurdity and call it good. The photo here is of my world, and a few of the goats therein. My writing studio/bedroom used to be a kindergarten classroom, we run obedience classes in the old gym, and the kitchen is way bigger than yours. I'm not bragging - merely stating the facts.

At the moment, Snuggles the muloccan cockatoo is screaming his bloody head off. If I sing to him (which I'll do in just a moment) he'll stop screaming and start singing along. He seems to prefer my personally penned ditties to top forty numbers, so here's what I just sang:

"Oh, we live in a school and I'm trying to write,
so settle down Snuggy or there's gonna be a fight -
nobody likes a squalling cockatoo even if they're cute
And if you keep on screaming, I'll give you proof you can't refute

Settle down Snuggy, there's nothing left to say
Just sing a little song and your blues will go away..."

And so on and so on. It's not that I'm complaining or anything, because as birds go, he's really a lovely one. I've been watching House lately, however, and people keep dying of dreadful diseases they got from bird poo, so I'm hesitant to get too involved in the whole bird rescue thing. Plus he bites if I irk him, and he's got a really sharp fucking beak. When he's not biting or screaming, however, he likes to cuddle up (hence the name, which I did not give him) and is perfectly charming. He's actually a lot like me that way.

Seven things about my sister

1. Her middle name is Hunter. My parents were going to give it to me if I was a boy. No dice. So they decided to give it to the next kid in line regardless of gender.
2. She cried when she thought Fox Mulder actually killed himself.
3. She had a carnival goldfish that lived for way way too long -- like 5 years.
4. She lived in the same room one of my friends did her freshman year at Fredonia.
5. She wrote a story in 3rd grade about how I forgot my bathing suit camping one time. It made me really mad she wrote it.... I am not sure why, it was not THAT embarrassing, but it still makes me mad today -- just on principle.
6. She sleeps with one arm thrown with abandon over her head.
7. Today is her birthday!

Observations made by the nerdy work side of my brain

I saw Superbad this weekend. (Michael Cera shined, and it was overall funny, but lacking the qualities that I adore in 40-year Old Virgin). There was a moment that bothered me in the movie. And it was one of those nerdy technical details. Michael Cera's character, Evan, is in math class. He is a senior in his last two weeks of high school. He is Dartmouth bound in the fall. He, and all of his classmates have Algebra II books on their desks.

NO WAY would a Dartmouth bound student be taking AII their senior year. They would have to be in Pre-Calc minimally, and even that is a stretch.

Come on! Evan is supposed to be wicked smart, and you slap an AII book on his desk! Please! Give the man some crazy hard Calculus!


And if you have not seen the web show, Clark and Michael, yet--you really should. You will some Arrested Development folk in there too. If I was 15, I would be TigerBeat wallpapering my room with Michael Cera. But I am not. So, I *clearly* don't.

Seven things to do this fall

1. Watch Pushing Daisies.
2. Eat and make as many pumpkin things as possible.
3. Mull things. Wine and cider, mostly.
4. Leaf peep as much as possible. Even the natives can appreciate that.
5. Cider donuts, find them and devour them.
6. Have a bonfire somewhere. Crisp cold and toasty goodness.
7. Think of a kick ass Halloween costume.