Schleep

So why is it that I can NOT get up in the mornings. Doesn't much matter how much sleep I've had. I just can't get up. My condolences to my patient roommate Tim, who has to listen to me hitting snooze about 10 times on 2 alarms, each morning. But can you blame me? After all I have a super comfy King Bed and it loves me. Ok, a little Seth Sleep History.

Ages 0-7: Don't remember.

Ages 8-13: Parents made us go to bed at 8pm every night. 8! Waking up was tough, especially for family scripture study, but it wasn't too bad.

Ages 14-19: This is best described by an example. I'd come home late at night from some activity. I'd turn on the light to my bedroom, drop my book bag, and fall onto my bed face first. I was asleep before my body touched the bed. Seriously. I'd wake up at 7:10 the next morning in my shoes, Levis, and coat. I'd change into a new shirt, grab a piece of bread and then cut through several of my neighbors back yards to catch the bus because I'd already missed it at my stop.

Mission: Well it goes without saying that I had regular sleep. It's just lucky that companionship study was after an hour of personal study. I don't like to talk in the mornings.

College: I think I averaged 4-5 hours of sleep a night, for most of my college career. Except when it was finals, in which case I averaged 2. My last 3 weeks of college I slept about 8 hours a week and became a connoisseur of energy drinks.

Now that I'm a working Professional: I can't go to be before midnight. It is utterly impossible. I generally get 6-8 hours of sleep. Thanks or no-thanks to my flexible work schedule, I rarely get to work before 9:30am.

Side Notes:

1. I can sleep anytime and anywhere.

(That's me on the bottom row. I fell asleep in the gym while on tour at BYU-Hawaii. Everybody lined up for the picture and a good laugh.)

2. I am an incredibly heavy sleeper. I wake for no man. I once fell asleep at a 4th of July city fair in the middle of a crowd of people.

3. I don't like to talk when I wake up. I'm super cranky. Give me a good 1-2 hours to get going.

You light sleepers are blessed.

Guau!

Ok people. This will give you an insight into one of my loves and passions. There are few things to enjoy in life that can compare with amazing dancing. I tend to get cravings at times. Hankerings. I just feel famished for a spot of amazing dancing. So I'm glad to have discoved that I can get thousands of amazing dance videos on youTube. Resolution is low, and tapped is never as good as live, but this still rocks. I hope you enjoy this as much as I do. If you ever come to a dance competition with me (planning to go to one in NYC over the summer) I'll get you hooked.

I've seen this couple a few times at competitions. They were 3rd or 4th in the world when this was recorded.

I Love You

Ok. Not the best picture, I know. But it's a live one. I was only like 5 people away from her. And she was rockin' me. I went to Joss Stone back in February with DeEtte at a tiny little venue in NYC. She only did 2 promotional shows before the release of her new album, and I went to one of them. This venue could not have held more than a few hundred people. Joss has an incredible mix of innocence and sultry stage presence. It's rather disarming and intriguing.

She had a 11 piece band. It consisted of 3 backup singers (the sista's - and yes he is also a sista), bass guitar, lead and backup guitar, pianist, keyboardist, trumpet, alto sax, and drummer (300 pounds of blinging, low riding, rhythm). The band kicked some serious trash. Joss came out and rocked her new single 'Tell Me About It'. Then she began to groove us with her neo-soul pipes. This 18 year old 6 foot British beauty (bit of an oxymoron) has the voice of a mature Harlem soul singer.

In my entranced and grooving state, I new I had to make contact with her. I waited for one of those moments of quite pause provided when the singer is prepping the audience for the next song. I found my moment and yelled out, "I love you Joss." She looked down in her shy and sexy way and said, "Thanks." Recognition. That's right. Everyone around me stared at me and said, "You just got recognition man. That's special." Dang straight.

We danced and grooved till she left the stage and then clamored until she came back for an encore. She came back with a dozen white roses. She started into a love ballad and then threw out a single rose. Being 6'3" has to count for something but destiny was on my side as I jumped and snagged the flor from the aire.

Joss and I have a special connection. But honestly the best part of the whole show was when she sang 'Right To Be Wrong'. She was rocking the song and we were all loving it. Then right close to when the song usually ends she sings, "Got a right to be wrong..." and she pauses. Everyone is just screaming and shouting. She waits till is starts to quiet and then sings again "Got a right to be wrong..." The crowd goes wild again and she waits for them to quiet down. Guys keep cat calling her so she finally puts her index finger on her lips and the crowd falls deathly silent. Then in her innocent yet provocative way she lightly sings but nearly speaks, "So just leave me.....alone." Then the band breaks back in and Joss starts wailing! They wail on for another 3 minutes of reprise improvey goodness.

mm.

She is going to be in Boston at the Avalon on June 11th. I'm going.

Art?

Banksy - Graffiti Artist

Wall between Israel and the West Bank:

Banksy's manifesto. May not seem to make much sense but think about it a little:

An extract from the diary of Lieutenant Colonel Mervin Willett Gonin DSO who was among the first British soldiers to liberate Bergen-Belsen in 1945.

I can give no adequate description of the Horror Camp in which my men and myself were to spend the next month of our lives. It was just a barren wilderness, as bare as a chicken run. Corpses lay everywhere, some in huge piles, sometimes they lay singly or in pairs where they had fallen. It took a little time to get used to seeing men women and children collapse as you walked by them and to restrain oneself from going to their assistance. One had to get used early to the idea that the individual just did not count. One knew that five hundred a day were dying and that five hundred a day were going on dying for weeks before anything we could do would have the slightest effect. It was, however, not easy to watch a child choking to death from diptheria when you knew a tracheotomy and nursing would save it, one saw women drowning in their own vomit because they were too weak to turn over, and men eating worms as they clutched a half loaf of bread purely because they had to eat worms to live and now could scarcely tell the difference. Piles of corpses, naked and obscene, with a woman too weak to stand proping herself against them as she cooked the food we had given her over an open fire; men and women crouching down just anywhere in the open relieving themselves of the dysentary which was scouring their bowels, a woman standing stark naked washing herself with some issue soap in water from a tank in which the remains of a child floated. It was shortly after the British Red Cross arrived, though it may have no connection, that a very large quantity of lipstick arrived. This was not at all what we men wanted, we were screaming for hundreds and thousands of other things and I don't know who asked for lipstick. I wish so much that I could discover who did it, it was the action of genius, sheer unadulterated brilliance. I believe nothing did more for these internees than the lipstick. Women lay in bed with no sheets and no nightie but with scarlet red lips, you saw them wandering about with nothing but a blanket over their shoulders, but with scarlet red lips. I saw a woman dead on the post mortem table and clutched in her hand was a piece of lipstick. At last someone had done something to make them individuals again, they were someone, no longer merely the number tatooed on the arm. At last they could take an interest in their appearance. That lipstick started to give them back their humanity.

Source: Imperial War museum

www.banksy.co.uk

MBA

I've always wondered what those MBA graduates are up to. I mean, besides coming up with corporate jargon like "synergy" and getting paid a lot more than me. Well here is what the MBA's at Raytheon are up to.

"The Raytheon red is evolving this year. The new red reinvigorates the Raytheon brand and provides additional richness and boldness that helps further distinguish our marketing and communication materials and our messaging from that of our competitors."

Wow that's exactly what I thought when I saw the new logo.

Here are the new guidelines:

PMS: 186
CMYK: 0,100,81,4
RGB 206,17,38

This is serious. Enjoy the logo:

He Was Injured

CHAROLLAIS (Saône-et-Loire, Burgundy, France · Goat-P)

I've dined at some of the finest restaurants in Philadelphia including, Fogo de Chao, Ruth's Chris, Cuba Libre, Brasserie Perrier, and Striped Bass. I've been using the wonderful benefits I receive from Uncle Ray to help me out. And while I've had some amazing and expensive culinary experiences (including the second and third best beef I've ever tasted) I found that for only 20 dollars, I could be filled with more delight. "Tria". It's a wine cheese and beer cafe, of sorts. It's got more of an old pub feel with none of the frat party. They are open late (1:15am - I freaking love you already) and have the finest of simple pleasures. I started with a cheese called "CHAROLLAIS (Saône-et-Loire, Burgundy, France · Goat-P) Dense, rich pate center with a crinkly almond colored rind—tart, intense, and beautiful." It was served on a little wooden platter with honey and some bread. As I took in this wonderful cheese I listened to Keane, U2, traditional Celtic music, and Jimmy Hendrix. Could life get better. It did. For my meal I had a 3 cheese and sun dried tomato toasted-panino along with Reed's Apple Cider Ginger Brew. After weeks of living in Philadelphia, I found my slice. It was a warm night tonight and it hints of Spring, my favorite time of year. I smiled the whole 2 blocks back to my hotel. Haven't done that in a while. It's been one month, and it still sucks.