(via Briefly Noted)

Recently, I discovered Atlas Obscura, “a compendium of this age’s wonders, curiosities, and esoterica.” It speaks to my heart:

The Atlas Obscura is a collaborative project with the goal of cataloging all of the singular, eccentric, bizarre, fantastical, and strange out-of-the-way places that get left out of traditional travel guidebooks and are ignored by the average tourist. If you’re looking for miniature cities, glass flowers, books bound in human skin, gigantic flaming holes in the ground, phallological museums, bone churches, balancing pagodas, or homes built entirely out of paper, the Atlas Obscura is where you’ll find them.

 
This guide is simply full of some of the most incredible stuff. For example, one of the entries in Pennsylvania, mere miles from where I went to high school, was totally unknown to me until now. How had I never heard of this place before!? It’s called The Sonorous Stones of Ringing Rocks Park, basically a field of musical, ringing boulders in the middle of the woods. Incredible.

[photo: David Hanauer]

Here in Philadelphia, you’ll find a number of odd spots, including the Shrine of Saint John Neuman. I’m going to have fun exploring (and contributing to!) this outstanding project. Lord Whimsy, you must be all over this already, yes?

I haven’t been blogging about bands all too often here on The PJS because I do most of that over on yvynyl lately. However, this band I just discovered is too mind-blowing not to share.

Stag Hare is a young fellow named Garrick Biggs who lives in the middle of Utah. Followers of Growing, Brightblack Morninglight and Faust (as I am a huge fan of all three) will certainly fall deeply in love upon first listen. Here, lemme show you:

Stag Hare – Born into Magic

Also, if you dig this, you should most definitely check out my dear friends Niagara Falls who have a new limited-edition vinyl LP available now and are playing a show tonight at The Marvelous in West Philly. I’ll be there!

I’m so excited about this film! When you live in Philadelphia, Zagar’s work creeps into your consciousness with this odd iconic ubiquity. So strange, and yet so beautiful and literally found in every nook and cranny of this city. The film was made by Jeremiah’s son, so it’s sure to be an intimate family portrait which tend to be some of my favorite kind of films.

Synopsis:
Over the past four decades, Isaiah Zagar has covered more than 50,000 square feet of Philadelphia with stunning mosaic murals. In A Dream is a documentary feature film that chronicles his work and his tumultuous relationship with his wife, Julia. It follows the Zagars as their marriage implodes and a harrowing new chapter in their life unfolds.

I can’t believe I missed the theatrical showing of this film last April, but now it’s coming out on DVD(?) and I plan on seeing it asap. Maybe it’s time for a documentary film house party! Who’s in?

[UPDATE: Luckily, I was wrong about that date - it's actually going to be in the Ritz at the Bourse starting April 17, 2009! Yes! Let's all go! Who's in?]

As some of you know, our awesome kitty Werner passed away earlier this month from a rare kitten disease. It was heartbreaking. We had only had him for about three months, but he was the first addition to our family and he was truly a special cat. Frail and small, but he had a huge heart.

It’s been almost a month since then, and we decided we sure missed a little furball running around our house so we went ahead and adopted another kitten from PAWS. Maysle saw me walking by his cage and immediately reached out to me. I’m pretty sure we were fated to be together. He’s adorable, soft and precocious. And yes, we continue the trend of naming out pets after our favorite filmmakers… we are nerds, after all.

I just whipped together a new website for Audrey’s band, Hunter/Gatherer. She’s recently joined forces with the very talented Jesse Hale Moore and I’ve been lucky enough to listen to them practice a bunch in our living room. Yes, I’m biased, but seriously, they are so good!! Have a quick look at the site. Fun fresh content, including songs, photos and more coming soon!

Also – Hunter/Gatherer has a new gig coming up in a couple weeks here in Philly on February 4th at Kung Fu Necktie in Fishtown. Mark your calendars!

Friend up H/G and listen to some demos on their MySpace.

[photo: Salt Lake Tribune]

I just wanted to give a quick shout out to this badass activist that I learned about while in Utah. His story isn’t in the national mainstream news yet (that I know of), but it was well covered in the Salt Lake Tribune which I read over coffee every morning over coffee at my in-laws. You should know this story.

Remember that shit that Bush pulled earlier this year, opening up a ton of America’s wild land to oil and gas exploration to help out his buddies on his way out the door? Land that is literally next door to our most incredible National Parks like Arches and Canyonlands?

Well, graduate student Tim DeChristopher went ahead and bid on a ton of those contracts… and WON! thereby throwing a vitrual wrench into the process. Obviously, the bad guys are pissed. Please read more about what’s going on, this amazing citizen action and the undoubtably horrible legal process that is now descending upon him. Maybe we can raise the money and help just buy out these contracts and preserve the land.

Edward Abbey would be proud. <3 <3 <3

I’m not normally one to plug products on my blog, but I thought it’d be nice to throw a good word out there about the people at Tom’s Shoes. My mother-in-law bought me a pair of these shoes last Christmas and they have grown to become one of my favorite pairs. They are extremely comfortable, good looking and fun to wear.

The cool thing about Tom’s though, are that they are donating a pair of shoes to children in need around the world for every pair they sell. I can dig that.

Plus, they are very stylee kicks!

Kelly Reichardt made a film a couple years ago, Old Joy, that, after watching it I called “one of my all time favorite films,” a sentiment that still stands today.

I’m very excited to learn of her new project (thanks NYTimes), Wendy and Lucy that is making the rounds of indie theaters. It’s slated for a run at the Ritz here in Philly starting January 23, and you know I will be there. If you haven’t yet been exposed to Kelly’s work, I highly recommend that you do. Here’s the trailer for the film:

Coincidentally, I read a piece in ReadyMade Magazine profiling Beastie Boy Adam “MCA” Yauch and his new venture Oscilloscope Pictures. Several times in the last week I have read a review or seen a trailer for an amazing looking film, including the documentary Dear Zachary, and they have been the producers/distributors. I’m very proud of the innovative work they’re doing and hope they keep putting out these fantastic films.

I’m trying out a new service called StoryTlr (embeded below) to retell the event in ‘real time’ as I Twittered it.

And this, coming a week after a super-high and drunk junky smashed his SUV into our neighbor’s parked car, totaling it. Ah, life.

Today is marks the 30th anniversary of the day I moved to America. I was almost 2 years old and my brother Dave was 6 months old in 1978 when my parents decided to move to the San Francisco Bay Area from Holland. This occasion is an especially important one to my Dutch father who always reminds us each year of why we moved. He said it best in his annual heart-felt email today:

November 8th is again the day to remember that the three of us came to the USA 30 years ago. As long as I am able I will remind you of that because you should not take for granted what this simple move 30 years ago has come to mean in our lives.

I have come to the USA not just to follow your mother home to California but to leave my country and culture. It was too easy for me to have stayed and the adventures to be found in Australia, Canada, New Zealand or the USA were more of my likings. Open countries with lots of opportunities. Opportunities to make these young countries better, while at the same time creating opportunities to grow and explore yourself.

In countries like to USA the opportunity to make a different is still here. I am sure that you agree or at least I hope you see that the USA, as bad as it may be sometimes, is still the country to be. I hope to have shown through my endeavors that we can make a difference. Making the world a better place, not for ourselves but for all people, this is what the USA needs, people who know that it is great to live and be here. I am glad that we not just came here for your mother, going to her home town, but that we are here to contribute and to be challenged by what this country has to offer. I hope and pray that you will never forget this last sentence because it is not only that we have come to the USA for this opportunity but that GOD placed us on this earth in this time frame to serve Him. Being in the USA only highlights this even more.

Again, happy anniversary and with many more prosperous years to follow.

I am proud to live in America. And even now, with my dual citizenship, I continue to live on this side of the Atlantic. Given the recent political events, I can confidently say I will be happy to continue to work to take advantage of my opportunities here and work hard to make this world a better place. Always. And I hope my father’s words will be an inspiration to you, too.

Gangi

I’ve been a fan of Matt Gangi’s music for something like two years, having completely randomly stumbled upon his MySpace page through friends. He’s an amazing songwriter and his sounds are completely 21st Century, but rooted firmly in the psychedelic era of the 60’s. He’s got an amazing ear and his partnership with Lyle Nesse on drums/drummachine/synth forms a killer duo. I’m so glad to have seen them play a small show at the studio/rehersal space/party house Inciting HQ last night – a complete treat.

06-animals

Magical, Beautiful

Magical, Beautiful is the band of my buddy Chris Keener whom I met years ago at True/False in Columbia, Missouri, his home town. He now lives in Chicago and collaborates with these fellas. We went to see them play at a small house show they booked, and I was blown away. Dualing synths, deep drums and what might be described as Joy Division-style vocals.

They just came out with their first music video recently:

Both of these bands are completely DIY operations, neither is on a record label. If you dig their music, I encourage you to click over to their websites and purchase their records. I have them, and I highly recommend them. Support indie music!

Meet Dr. Werner “Snake Eyes” Herzog. [update: okay, that is a ridiculous name. We just call him Vern now.]

Audrey and I have been talking about getting a pet for a while now, but then the other day, our friend had some stray kitties playing around in his backyard and we committed to taking one. Well, that plan didn’t turn out to be as easy as we thought. Turns out feral young cats are nearly impossible to catch bare-handed. We spent half the afternoon trying, using several different tactics, none of which worked.

In the end we gave up and went straight to PAWS (Philadelphia Animal Welfare Society), the awesome and highly recommended animal shelter on 2nd and Arch. After playing around with several cats, we were drawn to Werner particularly for some reason. For me it was his striking green eyes and his laid-back attitude. For Audrey it was his shiny gray coat and snugglability.

He was the perfect choice. The moment we brought him home he was completely at ease. And this, an ex-stray! He curiously nosed around the house confidently, then settled in the curling up in our laps and kneading his paws into our bellies. He’s an excellent cat. We’re convinced he’s an ‘old soul’ even though he’s only one year old. Hope y’all get to meet him soon!

He’s sitting on my lap watching me type this with focused intensity right this moment… I think he might be into blogging, too! Whoa.

[photo: ESPN/AP Photo/Chris Carlson]

Holy crap, I am so high from the Phillies amazing playoff run right now (though it might be the coffee). I haven’t been this baseball crazy since I was 12 and I was growing up in the Bay Area and going bananas for the Giants awesome playoff run that got them to play the A’s in the “Earthquake” World Series in 1989.

Jason Stark’s pride-inducing post-game write up starts off:

The magic of October is that you can’t script it, you can’t predict it, you can’t even explain it.

So who wrote this script? Who predicted this finish? Who can explain the unbelievable chain of events that have led the Phillies to the brink of their first World Series journey in 15 years?

My love of baseball has been fully revived. If I weren’t so damn broke, I’d snap this up in a hot minute:

Who doesn’t enjoy a good Martin Luther King, Jr. quote for some inspiration, eh? I just read this and it made me happy:

“I say to you, this morning, that if you have never found something so dear and precious to you that you will die for it, then you aren’t fit to live.

You may be 38 years old, as I happen to be, and one day, some great opportunity stands before you and calls upon you to stand for some great principle, some great issue, some great cause. And you refuse to do it because you are afraid.

You refuse to do it because you want to live longer. You’re afraid that you will lose your job, or you are afraid that you will be criticized or that you will lose your popularity, or you’re afraid that somebody will stab or shoot or bomb your house. So you refuse to take a stand.

Well, you may go on and live until you are ninety, but you are just as dead at 38 as you would be at ninety.

And the cessation of breathing in your life is but the belated announcement of an earlier death of the spirit.

You died when you refused to stand up for right.

You died when you refused to stand up for truth.

You died when you refused to stand up for justice.”

-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
From the sermon “But, If Not” delivered at Ebenezer Baptist Church on November 5, 1967.

Thanks, Tim.

I’ve never been a big TV watcher. While we were growing up, my mom used to limit us to something like “Sesame Street only!” No weekday cartoons. No cable. None of it. Sometime when I was in highschool she caved. But by that time I’d been bread with a certain distaste for television and particularly the clamorous advertising that goes with it.

Then along come ad-free TV dramas on DVD. It started with a LOST watching marathon last year. Then came Deadwood (still the best show ever). Then this past winter we ran the table on The Wire. And now, our newest obsession: Mad Men.

The art direction, the acting, the subject matter. All amazing. So utterly 1960. To watch it is to ponder my grandparents generation, that strange time just before the profound cultural revolution of my parents age. You can feel the repressed angst boiling under the surface in every episode. I love it. That tension drives the whole plot deeper and more exciting and more complex than it might otherwise in less skilled hands. So subtle. So brilliant.

Audrey’s going to laugh that I posted the photo above. That’s Joan Holloway, the office manager at Sterling Cooper. I have a huge crush on her.

Wow. Lightening at 1200fps. But what could possibly shoot that? It must be expensive. Uh, no. It’s the sub-$1000 Casio. Now I’m not one to start hawking product on my blog, but let me just tell you how badly I want this thing… *THIS* badly (where *THIS* is as big as a house).

Not only does this thing take stunning photos, but it’s got the holy grail of inexpensive video cameras: an external mic jack. Yes! Christmas is only a few months away…. (you reading this, Audrey?).

[photo: Wilson Rothman, Gizmodo]

Ariel Pink’s set was one of the best shows we’ve seen this year. Mesmerizing. It was last Friday night at the MRoom, ‘The Other Bar‘ as my friend Sammy likes to call it due to it’s proximity to our usual hang out, ‘The Bar‘, Johnny Brenda’s. Ariel jumped, writhed and moshed all throughout the crowd, working the room like a stadium concert. It was amazing. I hadn’t heard much of his music before then, but have been collecting samples all week since.

I’ve been a fan of the young opening band from Brooklyn called Chairlift for a while. They’ve got some great throwback synth-pop going on. I struck up a conversation with the band after their set and ended up inviting them to crash at our house for the night. Turned out to be fun, and we talked music all the next morning until they headed off to their next gig in Baltimore. Here’s their awesome single, “Evident Utensil“. I dare you not to like it.