On Desire

Play movie for computer, phone or youtube

An ALM inspired public service message about giving up jet travel, whipped up in response to a regional fund raising effort that seemed inherently contradictory. The more I learned the more I felt compelled to speak out. The catalytic event was the release of a video by musicians May Erlewine and Seth Bernard on their kickstarter site.

Several aspects of their project appear problematic, but I’ve focused on the environmental impact. I’m down with Awakening the Dreamer, a movement to realize a socially just, environmentally sustainable and spiritually fulfilling human presence on the planet. These three outcomes are inherently linked, achieving one at the expense of the other two is no achievement at all.

There are certainly bigger fish to fry, why critique local activists and artists? Who elected Dan Kelly the arbiter of worthiness?

Folks disagree on how dire our environmental situation is, but it’s pretty clear we’ve got to make a change. Transparency and open communication are critical to deciding what that change should be. If we artists and activists can’t figure out how to do transparency and communication within our extended local tribe, how can we expect anyone to figure it out?

I don’t know many of the principle actors personally, but I am aware of their worthy efforts in the past. For my part, I just spent the last couple of years searching for artifacts of future sustainable civilizations. Having sailed a 16 foot catamaran 600 miles Around Lake Michigan, I’ve got some unique information to share especially with regards to travel.

I’ll be posting on youtube after a bit more polish.

With ALM, I have three basic flows for telling the story – raw video, motion graphics and posts (text). Though I wasn’t as faithful with imaging everything, I was fairly thorough in my writing. I captured details that I certainly would have been forgotten now. The posts are ready made narrative. It’s another voice, a different Dan, another processing perspective.

What stories do I want to tell, what is the story? Are details like my struggle with Wordbooker worth telling? This geeky stuff might be trivia, but if ALM is about learning how to do a project, how to be low impact and effective, if it’s about an open source approach then these details could be the components of a future epiphany.

The details I choose to include reveal my opinion of what matters. What’s most important and what’s next most important? Including the disaster details means I can turn around and talk about what did work…

“The best gear (approach, attitude) is often not mentioned because it’s never part of the problem, it’s never a cause or contributor to trials and tribulations. Rather, good gear is an invisible assumed element of every solution. Here’s my roster of invisible stuff.”

Now we’re into collaborator territory. This could also make me a field testing force to be reckoned with. The question is – is grabbing collaborators part of my main theme(s)?

I can also bring the blog right into the movie as screen capture while narrating.

Tangents aside, there’s an immediate goal here – to make a first pass on the video, to post it. To revitalize the project and find out what it is, who’s on board. Can there be an online following between trips? How does that work?

Another tangent. Recently I saw Dave Hart and we had a great time just hanging out. When I think about philosophy of projects I am reminded of an argument we had about cam chocks for climbing protection, back on the South Manitou boat when he and I weren’t getting along so great. I gave Roger Bonnet’s argument that cam chocks were overly complicated, expensive poser gear. I can’t remember why Dave liked cams – maybe because they were a sort of one size fits all solution that ultimately reduced the amount of metal (and weight) on a rack. It doesn’t matter what you do or don’t know about climbing, the basic argument was simplicity vs complication. Both of us felt probably felt like we were arguing for simplicity.

Simplicity will emerge as one of my principles of preparing for and approaching a challenge, but my idea of simplicity has to be clarified, rigorously polished until it’s perfectly obvious.

What this all helps me to understand is that I’m ready to take another whack at the index cards and sort the main themes of the project. It’s a great day, except for this burning pain in my adrenals. But that’s another story.

An easy afternoon on the beach making adjustments to Hello World, mostly the straps and plates that secured the waterproof rifle cases. There’s also insights about yawning.

Behind the scene details were posted on June 6.

10-06-04 Adjustments in Arcadia, Michigan (computer, phone)

Around Lake Michigan, Search for Sustainable Civilizations

Watch the movie excerpt – 13:30 minutes. This is intended to give the basic premise of the project. What artifacts of future sustainable civilizations can be found in Ritch Branstrom’s interview?

The full size and fixed size versions require a fast internet connection. For slower connections, try small.

Feedback about the ALM excerpt is encouraged and appreciated via comments. Please let us know which link you followed above.

Day 15 – 16

Paused in the Pine Motel parking lot on the way back from Wallys, riding the Zilliax Miyata back to Oval beach in the rain. It was a warm rain and I wanted to add a little more to this blog entry. I stopped there for some solid wireless, dripping and pecking at the screen. I should have just checked in. I got back to Oval Beach and following through on my promise to not camp. I pushed Hello World into the surf and anchored for the night… or so I thought. Once out there snug in the tent, the wind came up and started to buffet the boat. Waves smashed the bottom of the trampoline and rolled down my spine. Backwards and forwards, up and down with Hello World creaking and complaining all the while. I eventually bit the bullet and traded my warmish sleeping bag for a wet wetsuit in preparation for an emergency beaching. The worst thing is to do have to hard manual labor after nearly falling asleep. She was secure by the time first light arrived and I got started getting her ready for a few days alone, hauling gear to the parking lot.

Day 16-19

Susan’s smiling face around 10:00 am then 45 minutes back to Kalamazoo (Kzoo, Kazoo) and Garland Gardens (Vince and Susan’s house). Trot the gear up to my garret and start charging. Quick tour of the home farm, 100+ tomato plants. Vince’s mom and Aunt Rose arrive, then Vince himself from packing his classroom, (they’re refinishing the floors at school over the summer). Pizza for dinner, then off to record Vince performing with the Kalamazoo Mandolin and Guitar Orchestra conducted by Miles Kusik and featuring Carlo Aonzo. There’s an after glow at our house where I finally break out the Larrivee and play and sing with members of KMGO. Vince fuels the evening with homebrew beer.

Since constant vigilance and top performance is not currently required, my body demands rest. I yawn and groan constantly.

Wake up on Thursday and organize the blog and posts. I am way behind and intent on catching up. Processing Vixia video with Final Cut Pro takes time, so the computer and hard drives are constantly munching. In the afternoon take the camera to a practice of Great Lake Aquatics (Akitas) the swimming club and racing team that Vince coaches. His coaching is what I’ve come to document. Use the Aquapac underwater bag for the Vixia successfully, tho it continues to be awkward. Kids are a little creeped out by guy in pool with camera. I am caught of guard when Vince introduces me after practice and do a lame job of explaining the project. Home for dinner with Susan and noodling on guitars. Blackout.

Great Lakes Aquatics Summer Solstice swim meet starts on Friday and I’m there to make movies of the Akitas racing against other clubs from around the Michigan and Canada. Catch a ride there and back with Dan from the team, a habitually happy guy. Big storm sweeps through with winds up to 70 mph on Lake Michigan. I fret for Hello World and put a call into Vicki at Oval Park and text to Dave and Allison at Saugatuck Dunes Coastal Alliance. While waiting for the pot of oopama I am making for the fam and visiting swimmers, get creamed at the card game Set by teens. Spend an hour or so interviewing Vince. Video processing is ongoing, begin to run short on hard drive space. Will have to buy additional drives eventually.

Visit the meet again on Saturday for events with Swim for Success kids. Party again at the house with the meet officials and some of the other coaches. Interesting conversation about how pool swimmers have anxiety about open water. Problematic to move pool swimmers to a wild venue (we got lakes) for promotion and expansion of swimming sports around Michigan. Vince and Susan force me to agree to visit the Ondrej, Mattej and Jan Pekarovic at their goat ranch on the way back to Saugatuck Sunday. I disappear to edit Vince’s video and blow off packing.

Watch for a flurry of blog and video posts in the next 24 hours. I’ll be in Kalamazoo with Susan and Vince until Sunday morning then heading back to Saugatuck Dunes Natural Area where Hello World is parked.

Getting close now. Order of operations seems to be holding together, it’s spooky that I’m mostly on schedule. Everything can go right between now and launch… it’s possible.

I am noticing more, recognizing the unfolding of a larger story. A lot of ideas to fit into a coherent movie… I guess I started this, mostly just made myself available and let the pieces fall into place. Is this what I want?

How it began… On location in 2006 shooting my first movie with a budget. For the next two years I spent most of my days free climbing the first movie learning curve. Daughter of God – http://dogthemovie.com. I kept the fridge full with freelance production work for NYC dancers.

In 2008 I spent yet another perfectly good summer sweating in a tiny apartment staring at screens. The DOG project has merit and is worth finishing, will be finished. Is anything worth giving up a whole summer of diving Crystal’s blue, of running barefoot in the forest, of waking up to waves lapping?

Here’s the deal… Daughter of God is set in a post apocalyptic world, it’s a post apocalyptic surreal romantic comedy, sinister in the sense that some humans still dream of asphalt plains resplendant with the snaking migrations of countless multi-colored cars. It’s over tho, human population has been devastated, industrial infrastructure deleted and nature is reclaiming the cities. Certainly there’s toxic aftermath, sure the survivors are traumatized, but they dress snappy!

Meanwhile, back in RL I’m listening to Democracy Now every morning on WBAI radio. Assembling a fictional apocalypse seems pretty pointless when an actual apocalypse is nigh – I can never match the Pentagon’s special fx budget, let alone Gaia herself.

I wondered… Is DOG the best use of my time right now? Wouldn’t I rather be swimming? How about that super hero correspondence course I just aced?

That’s the setup. In the autumn of 2008 Kai invited me to make a documentary about sailing in Hawaii and – of course – sustainability… Well? What would Jesus do?

That was earth momma’s little joke. Come summer 2009, Kai abandoned Desire and Pele for a motor sailor… and I noticed there was a 30 year old Hobie Cat in my driveway.

Is this what I want? To act as an agent of Earth disguised as a pirate filmmaker? Hours drifting wind free followed by contact improv with Shiva? Three months of wilderness occasionally interupted with regionally brewed stouts and porters? The making of a saint?

I say, Yes.

Time for a list of lists, a preliminary inventory. With 19 days left, we’ve got to design the optimal sequence of actions. To avoid the carbon cost of airplane flight, new gear needs to be shipped ground which means ordering within the week. Gear requests should be started first so we’ve got to decide what we want and who we are going to ask by Monday.

One of the prerequisites for asking is an effective introduction to the project. This is where the mini-movie fits in and it’s several days behind schedule. We are just going to have to make requests based on written materials with references to the long running video excerpts. There are five components to our collaboration proposal – a good idea (√), a coherent and workable plan (√), established distribution channels eg Ondesire.com, Facebook and Twitter (√), a documented mob (growing) and an articulate introduction (pending). Having a non profit umbrella would also be helpful so that contributions would be tax deductible. Since I missed my NP liaison last month, I doubt I could set this up before June 1, so I may just have to skip that. Perhaps it’s worth a phone call.

Monica Evans asked about making cash donations to the project. The trip itself is not all that expensive because it’s designed to be replicable/low budget/low impact, but post-production after the trip could cost $30k for labor and services. Asking for money doesn’t have to happen before launch, but it wouldn’t hurt to identify prospects now. I could then schedule several days during the trip to make these requests.

The origins, an overview. I’ve written deeply about the inspiration and origins of the project. Along with completing and posting the mini-movie, linking to the most articulate of these posts is vital. Methinks it might be a good idea to link first (today) and the sort out the mini-movie immediately after.

We’ve can instantly develop a starting inventory by linking to last September’s checklists, and then replace them with updates. They will also be helpful in identifying gear collaborators.

Posting our itinerary will not only trigger suggestions from the tribe about where to go and who to see, but other potential collaborators.

Finally, Hello World needs glass and rigging repair. There’s about a week worth of labor plus curing time after each patch, so this has got to begin no later than day 14 on the countdown.

So – here’s the  order of operations draft…

19 days

• inventory/checklist rebuild 4/18

• introduction with links to inspiration and origins 4/18

• inventory revised with potential collaborators identified 4/18

• mini-movie 4/18+

18 – 16 days

• asks initiated 4/19 – 4/21 + mini-movie

• itinerary posted

17 -15 days

• ordering 4/22 – 4/23 + mini-movie

14 days

• Hello World repair 4/24+

12 – 10 days

• ordering and ask follow up 4/26-4/28

9 – 8 days

• provisions 4/29-4/30

• hulls complete and float test

7 days

• preliminary pack 5/1

• trailer and transport arranged

6 – 5 days

• final orders and provisions 5/2-5/3

4 – 2 days

• complete Hello World repairs and adjustments 5/4-5/6

1 days

• final pack 5/7

0 days

• trailer to E beach, launch party, overnight 5/8

ALM 1

• launch 5/9

Here are the general questions which helped me to develop this post.

Who can help, what companies are already involved?

What companies could be involved?

What’s the itinerary so far?

What does Hello World need to be water ready?

What provisions and consumables are needed?

The On Desire tribe reached it’s objective yesterday of 100+ fans for the Facebook page and the Around Lake Michigan movie project.

“This milestone demonstrates that we’ve got a solid core of kick ass collaborators,” said Dan Kelly, ALM’s guide. “Everyone knows that the fool in front of the camera is just the red ribbon on the birthday present, a bit of whipped cream on top of the sundae. We’ve got one hell of a Sundae going down here – the works! Bananas, several flavors of ice cream, nuts… all organic and fair trade of course. Most important though, remember the big dirt ball underneath – Earth. You can’t have a sundae or much of anything without a life friendly planet, well cared for and robust.”

No one was quite sure what Kelly meant by all this, but his delivery was very enthusiastic and animated.

Angela Saxon was one of several newly recruited fans who had no idea what they was signing on for,

“now i’ve gotta figure out what On Desire is all about…”

Due to the hypnotic nature of the Facebook interface, Luke Kelly and Winslow Morgan were able to induce a powerful Svengali effect, as evidenced by Mikayla Bajtka’s and Tim Howard’s posts,

“oh yah i think thats the one my friend luke told me to join lol.”

“OK winslow I fan-ed up”

Though effective, outright bullying triggered residual resentment, as evidenced by this response from the project’s potential spiritual advisor Victoria Weinstein,

“Yo mo-fo, I did it. Okay?”

“Whatever it takes,” responded Kelly. He said some other stuff too but folks were certainly more interested in the naked swim advertised to celebrate the 100 fan milestone. Dan and the project fabrication specialist, Patrick Kelly estimated the water temperature to be in the 40-45 degree F range. Why cherries? It’s Michigan. Roll the video.

10-04-16 Swim to celebrate 101 Facebook fans variable / full screen
10-04-16 Swim to celebrate 101 Facebook fans fixed size

Here’s a rough sketch of an introduction to artifacts, one of the components that’ll help explain and set-up the Search for Sustainable Civilizations. I’m running late on the mini-movie / extended trailer, let’s see what happens this weekend.

Without further eloquence…

Richard Burris, Artifacts (full screen)

or

Richard Burris, Artifacts (smaller but more compatible)

Lovely chill morning. Yesterday I surprised a fox as I came out of the house. Sienna and umber, pretty big too. He wasn’t in a huge hurry, eventually trotting off past the nitrogen accumulator (outhouse). Last Friday I passed a momma fox and her kits lounging on some cottage stairs. It’s still too early for most of the lake houses to be occupied, so the foxes have carte blanche. Never seen so many that I can recall.

Today I continue with the mini movie. I need to amp up the global life support system sequence. I think it happens after Larry does MIR the first time. Then we’ll show iconic examples of life support, balance maintained in the face of entropy. Examples from NASA, scuba and science fiction. When we play Larry the second time, we’ll be into the connection between Hello World and MIR with the rebuild and packing. The next question will be – why? Why go on this trip?

I edited a short sequence with Dick on Beaver Island, tho the sound quality isn’t stellar. He’s a mason with 68 years of experience, 40 of those working with stone. He talked about his trip to Peru and the stones there – artifacts of a technology (and perhaps even a worldview) that we moderns don’t understand.

The Peruvian stones/culture sequence leads to the trip’s premise.

“We assume that modern industrial capitalistic civilization is the pinnacle of human achievement, but if ancient people could do things that we can’t what else are we missing? If our civilization isn’t the most advanced, what does advancement look like? Certainly future civilizations must be sustainable – in accord with the planetary life support system – because we can’t stay suicidal indefinitely. We expect our kids, grandkids, nieces and nephews to have a future. Certainly to survive and even to thrive. Sustainable civilizations must emerge within the next 10-15 years. Since entire civilizations don’t just pop up overnight, they must *already* be in the process of emerging. We should be able to poke around and find evidence of future sustainable civilizations everywhere, right now. Just like the stones in Peru are artifacts of an advanced ancient civilization, so too there must be artifacts of advanced future civilizations. Can we find these artifacts and figure out what they imply, what they are pointing towards?”

“What does an artifact of a future sustainable civilization look like? How do we go about searching for them? I think it starts with asking the right questions… Listen to this talk I had with Ritch Branstrom and see if you hear any clues about the future.”

Ritch interview (already edited).

Review Ritch’s “artifacts”, bullet points.

Conclusion / credits

I watched one of the worst movies last night, one that I had seen long ago – Dino De Laurentiis and David Lynch’s Dune. There were so many awful things, but especially bad were the voice overs of characters thinking.

I’m working on a voice over for Around Lake Michigan, a way to get the search started. It might be fun to do an homage to De Laurentiis / Lynch. Imagine the ALM guide, gazing heroically over a rocking horizon or shaving in his rain pounded tent. We hear his thoughts…

•••

Where you see rocks, watch out! They’re going to come alive… Alan Watts.

Earth is a giant ball of rock and metal skinned with life. Where does the rock end and the life start? People are alive, and trees and animals, that’s for sure. There’s even tiny things alive in the soil. Life is everywhere. Supposedly though, these things are not alive – water, rocks, air. Folks argue about how life came from non life – god or darwin. I am more interested in how life stays here. Whether by accident or design, the earth is a nice place to live. Everything is just so – the precise amount of oxygen in the atmosphere, consistent temperature, the right kind of light… but how does it stay that way? Somehow, life friendly conditions are maintained. That’s the global life support system, (analogies from NASA and science fiction abound).

Can humans damage or break the global life support system? Have we already? Maybe. Probably. Shit.

A more useful question is, can humans live in accord with it? Can we actually become an integral part of the global life support system? What would that look like?

A sustainable civilization would be in perfect accord with the global life support system. Concepts like garbage and pollution would be obsolete, archaic. There would be no consumption or waste, only cycles of transformation and renewal. Energy is free and abundant.

Hard to imagine, right?

The amazing thing is this…

•••

This could be a preface for the premise.

In a scalding tub, burning away the muscle ache from yesterday’s kooky backward run. I skip showers for several days running just so I can dip neck deep in steamy agua caliente.

Today I bought a minivan from my fam and pondered how to introduce the concept of future artifacts into the project. I’ve got some major elements present in the current extended trailer. What’s missing is character development including DK’s science fiction influenced premise for Around Lake Michigan which points to artifacts of future sustainable civilizations. Take a breathe!

What does an artifact of FSC look like? Tricky, that. An artifact is anything that gets us past the hospice culture and on into living. Sure there will always be uncertainty, but can’t we take the pistol out of our maw for a decade or two, just give it a rest? Yes we can! Yes we did – in the post present.

Artifacts are telegrams from the future – we solved it and here’s how. Jet cars or sail boats? Soylent green or CSAs? Artifacts can be RL processes and perhaps cybernetic extensions. When Mozilla builds an open source Facebook into Firefox – that sort of thing. If Monsanto were run by Geshe Michael.

I know, it’s Dan Kelly’s perplexing internal world. Not since Tolkien has any artist fabricated a fantasy so arcane and detailed. Forget about comprehensible, this is the future talking. Buckle your seatbelts.

We’ll clarify all soon enough. The really big waves are preceeded by a sucking sound.

Either by…

http://twitter.com/OnDesire

or

http://twitter.com/FutureArtifacts

Thanks for taking the time to check us out.

My name is Dan Kelly and I am working on the documentary movie. From May – August of 2010, I’ll be sailing a 16 ft catamaran all the way around Lake Michigan – solo. That’s about 1000 miles.  Along the way I’ll visit people and places related to sustainability. With a high quality mobile production kit,  I’ll record my discoveries and post them here.

I want to establish local connections before I go, that’s why I followed you. You might have great ideas about where to stop or who to visit. Perhaps you’d like to meet me yourself and talk about the future over tea or a beer.

Feel free to wander around this site and learn more. If you are intrigued with the project, email me directly wild@artisthouse.com or  follow me for updates on Twitter – http://twitter.com/OnDesire.

Thanks for your time!

Dan
Hello World
and the On Desire team

Since the Around Lake Michigan movies are presented in a resizable window outside of the blog proper, folks couldn’t comment – doh! Just created a stack of posts to fix this slight oversight… and away we go!

Watch the movies and let us know what happens to you!

I scanned and posted the audience feedback cards within a week of the Evening of Exploration, but over a month went by before I read and sorted them into categories. Why did it take so long? This question triggered a small crisis – Am I loosing momentum on the ALM project? Do I have a plan? What have I accomplished in the 3 months since the end of the trip?

This is one of those exciting blog moments where I have to grope around for a bit. Flashback!

October – December 2009

In early October Hello World and I returned home with about 30 hours of HD video. During the next two weeks I converted the video, shot a visual inventory and edited Evolution, the repair and packing sequence. I sorted, cleaned and stored all the gear. Hitching a ride back to Brooklyn with my brother Steve on 10/20, I settled down to catalog the video and post excerpts to the ondesire blog. Was there a feature length documentary lurking in there somewhere?  In theory, a methodical review of the raw material would allow major themes to percolate.

Watching the video and seeing all the folks who supported ALM started me fantasizing about throwing a big party. I also wanted to introduce more of my Northern Michigan tribe to the project and expand it’s audience. I imagined organizing an event around a rough cut of the movie and including structured feedback both to foster interaction and create a sense of participation. I was planning to return to to Northern Michigan for Thanksgiving anyway, maybe a month was enough time to plan an event and cut a rough…

The Evening of Exploration was born!

Turns out that 1 month was not enough time to become familiar with all the footage, edit something coherent AND organize / promote a public exhibition. I dedicated a lot of energy to getting the theater filled – repeatedly emailing the scattered tribe, blogging, creating enticing imagery and composing press releases. To expand and diversify the audience, I invited Gretchen Eichberger to present choreography and the ukulele duo Saldaje (Melonie Steffes and Shawn Anchak) to play music. The price I paid for a nearly full theater was less time for editing.

Sweating bullets that the bumpy NYC to Chicago Amtrak ride would ding the stack of sata hard drives humming at my feet, I finally found a decent introduction – only four days before the Evening. My brother and sister helped me hash out a protocol for audience feedback in the rental car from Chicago to Beulah. Over the holiday, I grappled with the stark realization that my rough cut would NOT be the kernel of a coherent structure, but rather a smorgasbord of loosely connected ideas.

The Evening was fun and I reconnected with many excellent people. My original objectives were achieved to varying degrees…

Celebrate those who helped with the project

Seeing themselves onscreen often makes folks excited. Just being invited to a special event is nice too, especially if there’s food and  interesting art. I could’ve done a better job of recognizing the collaborators if the movie had credits and / or if I mentioned specific names during my introduction. Basically, that didn’t happen because I ran out of time.

Connect regional folks to the project, build community support and awareness

It’s been over a month since the evening, so if I am planning on following up and consolidating this audience, I had better do it in the next couple of days. The evening did facilitate a productive feedback session with Steve Elrick. Also, a fantastic new friend and ally has appeared as a direct result of the Evening’s intense promotion. Andrea Maio is a film maker who missed the Evening but tracked me down after. We had a blast hanging out and she has since decided to relocate to Benzie County. I’ll be linking to her blog as soon as it’s up. Finally, Susan Koenig wrote an article about the Evening that may or may not have appeared in the Benzie Record Patriot, I’m still waiting to hear.

Get some structured feedback

I threw a variety of material at the audience, curious only to know what stood out, what made an impression. My feedback protocol wasn’t all that rigorous because the editing had barely begun. The responses were useful, the same five moments were mentioned by 52% of the audience. Several folks disregarded my instructions and offered detailed advice about editing and some even felt compelled to trot out their personal angst… awesome! I am so grateful for the responses, the only people I have a beef with are those that didn’t bother to fill out cards – like my brother and father. Geez, relatives can be a real pain.

Deadline motivates

Setting an intense deadline was both good and bad.

Rather than taking that the time to move methodically through the video, I was forced to slam together disparate fragments just to have something to show. This deferred the real edit process by a month. As the Evening got closer, I felt very scattered and struggled to let go of my expectations. I fretted that telling a disjointed story would actually deter the audience from following ALM’s progress. Key elements of the event were scaled down or abandoned because time was tight.

I am only now recovering from the trauma of promising a little too much.  Deadlines are productive only when matched to specific outcomes well within the range of the possible. Deadlines can have an element of risk, they can stretch our identity and push our personal envelope – a little. Finessing the balance between what we are and what we want to be is the art of the setting deadlines. It’s wise to take an inventory of variables first – how many new things will have happen at once? Even for a turbo charged polymath, attempting more than 2 new things is asking for trouble.

The Evening would have been a better if I had conceptualized the event as presenting ‘selected excerpts’, rather than promising a ‘rough cut’. The problem was in my own mind, most folks don’t know the difference between selected excerpts and a rough cut anyway. Crazy expectations caused me to wig out.

December 2009 – January 2o1o

I whiled away another 2 weeks in Beulah before renting a Hyundai and returning to Brooklyn. Once back, I bit the bullet and dropped $2000 on 20 x 1 TB hard drives for cloning my archive. I need about 6 drives more to finish, but at least now I can travel with ALM. I finally tallied the feedback results and posted some comments. Andrea suggested a new tack for the project that I like. I’ve been reorganizing the blogs in preparation for the next push and feel the power flowing back. So maybe I am not groping anymore.

Lake Michigan shares 1600 miles of shoreline with 4 states. The 2009 expedition of Around Lake Michigan explored about 300 miles or 1/5 of the perimeter in 3 weeks.

x

x
x

1. Elberta Beach 09/05 – 09/06

2. South of Esch Road and Otter Creek 09/06 – 09/07

3 South of Sleeping Bear Point 09/07 – 09/08

4 Crescent City, North Manitou Island 09/08 – 09/10

5 Northport 09/10 – 09/11

6 West End Beach, Traverse City 09/11 – 09/17

7 Old Mission Peninsula 09/17 – 09/18

8 Barnes Park 09/18 – 09/19

9 Charlevoix 09/19 – 09/20

10 St James Bay, Beaver Island 09/20 – 9/23

11 Garden Island 9/23 – 9/24

12 UP 9/24 – 9/25

13 Dune Buggy Blowouts 9/25 – 9/26

14 Stonington Peninsula 9/26 – 9/30

15 South of Crescent City, North Manitou Island 9/30 – 10/1

16 Point Betsie (bike ride back to house) 10/1 – 10/2

Still working on getting over the last dregs of my Honolulu cold. Several interesting developments in the last week though. Apple has come through on it’s pledge to loan us a spanking new Macbook Pro laptop with all the latest software to write and edit video from your lap. I also went ahead and bit the bullet on buying a video camera that fits my action packed lifestyle. Panasonic, who also make bullet proof laptops called Toughbooks, offers a flash card video camera that’s water proof (to 5 feet) right out of the box. Between the laptop and the camera I hope to get the On Desire project at least off of the ground into a low hover.

One of the things about being in barnacle mode, as opposed to spending much of my effort surviving on the food chain, is that occasionally a really tasty morsel drifts your way. Serendipitous synchronicity. It’s just a matter of patience and recognizing it when it is brought to you on the current.

Yesterday I got a call from Dr. Roli, a good friend of mine in San Diego. He asked me if I’d be interested in helping him deliver a 58′ Mandarin motor sailer (Sea Horse Shipyards, Hong Kong) named Jungle from Hawaii to Newport, CA. I spoke with Jim, the owner, this morning for about an hour and a half.

It sounds like a solid boat, appointed well with the makings of a capable crew. In a worst case scenario Roli and I could run the boat by ourselves. Plus Jim wants to pay me to do a bunch of electronic/electrical upgrades on the boat. The time frame is to leave from Ko Olina, HI on August 22nd with about a 20 day passage to Newport, CA.

That gives me plenty of time to get Desire sorted out, as well as work on some video stuff and do some sailing on Siesta.

I don’t see a down side.

Watch Gretchen Eichberger at Shop and Save

Here’s another chapter of On Desire in collaboration with Gretchen Eichberger and the Northwest Michigan Folklife Center. Camera ops are Patrick and Yo. Enjoy!

The first wave of Transpac 2009 starts without me tomorrow. Jets are only $100 from LA to Honolulu – not an option. So how am I getting to Hawaii?

I spoke to the San Francisco office of Greenpeace and passed them my information. I also tweeted what I believe to be the GP national office in Washington DC. I’ll follow up on Monday.

On the suggestion of my brother Mike I called Don Seth,  an alumni of the United States Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point. He gave me Lisa’s number at the Academy and she said that it’s hard to get civilians on government boats after 911, but that she would try and find contact info for her environmental liason. Don also suggested I survey the harbor masters for news of boats headed to Hawaii, which I’ve started.

There are no cruise ships going to Hawaii until September. That’s kind of a relief actually. Shuffleboard gives me the willies.

I’ll be reposting to all the Cruiser communities on Monday. Findacrew has been sending me updates, but so far the closest they’ve come is a research boat returning to California from Hawaii in late August. That could have worked for the ride back, but my posted profile did not scintillate the ship’s skipper.

It’s time to talk to the container ship companies. This is my first preference and so I’ve taken a little more time getting ready to make the calls. As I’ve mentioned in earlier posts, container ships are a major enabling component of the Hawaiian economy and consumer culture in general. Documenting a container ship’s passage to the islands would be a fantastic starting segment for On Desire.

I have about 6 more days for my ship to come in. Passage can take from 7-30 days and it’s already almost July. So we are right down to the wire. Whoo hoo!

In other news, I’ve been working with the Bear Lake fellowship to get their movie business up and running. The entire team was out in the field yesterday to document a local band. Then Gretchen Eichberger, Patrick and I shot a fantastic segment in the Shop and Save for the Northwest Michigan Folklife Center and On Desire. We may try another pass today.

Patrick and I bought a 16′ Hobie cat with trailer for $400 from Benzonia potters Alan and Suzie Vigland. A serious platform for adventure! Stone monger Mike Murphy and I are picking it up today.

Here’s to magic and flowing with the cosmic plan.

Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Foundation is trying something interesting. They are posting chapters of the documentary Rethinking Afghanistan as they are completed. This provides for a lot of interaction and audience involvement, even audience building. Here’s the URL…

http://rethinkafghanistan.com/

I heard an interview with Greenwald on the radio program Counterspin and it was beautiful, because I had been thinking along these lines for The Desire Project the last few days. I was riding around in the rain today (warm rain – euphoric) and thinking about how important it is to get some NYC context before I jaunt for Michigan and then west. It all gelled after listening to Greenwald, I need to shoot and cut several short “chapters” between now and May 15.

Here’s Counterspin for 05-01-09, Robert Greenwald’s interview is in the last third or so of the file. Don’t get him mixed up with Glenn Greenwald who discusses torture earlier on.

Watch Astoria Virgin

This is supposed to be a video blog, so finally I am getting around to catching up on the chapters of the story. Here’s the first Vixia video from April 7, shot with an HF-11 I later exchanged for an HFS-10. Today is actually June 16, but I back posting this to keep them in sequence.

Astoria Virgin refers to the first time me and the virgin Vixia went to visit Faisal in his Astoria crib. I cut this little vignette to prove that one could get Vixia files into Final Cut Pro. It’s auspicious that my swell pal Faisal had his soul captured first.