"I'm Broke"

Over the past few weeks I have heard the phrase “I’m broke” cited as a reason for not being able to do something discussed in several conversations. Ever since I was in college, I have found “I’m broke” to be one of the more misused and inaccurate terms used in casual conversation.

I had numerous friends in college who habitually would use the term “I’m broke” yet still amazingly have the resources to be in the bars buying $5 drinks on Fridays and Saturdays. They were also the ones who ate out with the greatest frequency. Even when I worked at Put-in-Bay, where most of my friends were bartenders and waitresses, people would drop “how broke they were” into conversations pertaining to financial outlook. I was a bartender myself at the time and we were all making money hand over fist for our ages. I knew these people were not really broke. I never really believed them and never quite understood why they felt the need to use the term. I also never asked or drilled into their reasoning.

Once I moved to Boston and tried to make it as a musician, I learned the true meaning of being “broke.” “Broke” was not having the money to pay rent and being evicted from an apartment (multiple times). Broke is being hungry and not having even enough money for a candy bar. Broke is not having a bank account because it was closed when your account stayed at a negative number for more than a few days. Broke is when they tow your car and you don’t have any money to get it out of the impound lot...ever. Broke is when you can’t even afford to buy cigarettes by the single. Broke is when you are so tired from being hungry that your only option is to sleep to conserve energy. This is “broke.”

Back then, as I made friends in Boston who shared my social status, it was welcoming to hear people speaking of “being broke” and really meaning it. Regardless of the tough times, it was wonderful to have found linguistic accuracy and honesty. “I’m broke as hell” was often dropped as a precursor to new friendships where, out of necessity and lack of any other options, we stood on the street and talked for hours.

I have since then come to realize the difference between really being “broke” and simply using the phrase as a means for saving money. In fact, I think it might be a cultural phenomenon equating to lying to oneself in order to somehow quell unnecessary spending. It’s a phenomenon that I have noticed most often in white, middle class people. Now that I have become part of the technical definition of the white middle class, I have actually even found myself using related thinking strategies when addressing my own financial situation. I still would never proclaim myself “broke” because I am not and I have been.

A Day in The Life

I am working with my boss and some faculty to prepare a video proposal for a learning experience that will utilize captured movement from Second Life and deliver it as part of a Flash based learning simulation. The video proposal will be a mix of real video and captured action from Second Life. In order to begin production of the piece I actually needed to learn how to use Final Cut Pro. My first exercise was to get better at 3D modeling within Second Life, then filming within Second Life and then pulling everything into Final Cut, marking, editing and adding titles. Final Cut is a great pro app and very intuitive. Filming in Second Life however is a bit more of a challenge (at least to get the camera work looking pro) I made this video called "A Day in The Life" to help me get used to filming and editing. Much of the footage would not pass any aesthetic tests for final product but it did help me learn a lot about framing shots, camera movement and the rhythm of editing. Note in the early part of the video, some of the footage of the first building on Ohio University's virtual campus that I just finished modeling. Eventually, I will need to turn to pre-developed camera movement scripts in Second Life to help me get smoother and higher quality raw footage. You will need QuickTime to view the clip. http://www.keeseys.com/music/day.mov

Bum Wine

Why do I find this so amusing? From the illustrations on the front page to the reviews of each of the individual brands of swill, I was entertained:

http://www.bumwine.com/

Rain on the Spinach, Blood in the Stool

I am a vegetable freak. I eat a salad almost every night of the week. I load up a big bowl full of Spinach, Carrots, Tomatoes, Mushrooms, Olives, a bit of cheese and stuff myself with this pile of health. Last night was no different. I got home a little late after a workout. I made my big-ass salad, sat down in front of the TV to finally relax and enjoy my vegetable mix. Three big bites in to my feast, CNN broadcasts that all bagged spinach, in all US states is suspect for e coli virus and should be thrown out. Buzzkill. I promptly heaved my vegi smorgasbord into the garbage disposal and waited for the abdominal cramping and bloody diarrhea, sure signs of e coli poisoning, to commence. So far so good.

Puffball Heaven

This was the scene I found in my backyard the other day:

Puffballs...Puffballs...Puffballs

Tons of puffballs. That picture is a re-creation since I forgot to take a photo when I hopped off the mower to pick up my mushroom booty. When I was a kid, my neighbor and I used to hunt puffballs out in the woods and his old man would then deep fry them. I've got 'em in my refrigerator now waiting for me to decide how I am going to prepare them. I found these simple recipes online here: http://www.mykoweb.com/cookbook/puffballs.html

I've got plenty of them and tried to pawn some off on my neighbor but they won't eat them so if you are looking for puffballs and are willing to make the drive, I'll by happy to send you home with some;-)

Keeping Your Day Job

So to the point... So simple... Such an instantly memorable melody and lyric... Send this link to your co-workers and see how long it takes before you hear people humming it in the halls:

http://www.keeseys.com/music/whipass.wma

Mixed Bag of Grass, Vomit and Shame

I have a mixed bag of rather banal items today.

The weather here has been dreary, wet and miserable for the last few days. The grass is thicker and greener than it was in May. Some of this is what several Appalachian natives have defined to me as "Fall Grass." Where I come from we simply call it crab grass. All the rain forced me and everyone else to put off mowing until the grass was halfway up to our knees. Then we all had to mow in the rain yesterday and make a hell of a mess just to hack it down and keep it under some sort of control. How do people in Seattle deal with their grass when it rains for weeks at a time?

The students are all returning back to Athens to mixed emotions for myself. It's good to have the "bustle" and youthful energy back here. At the same time, I arrived to work having to step over 2 huge puddles of peuk on Thursday. I could take or leave the peuk part. I've already seen several disheveled girls doing their "walks of shame" which becomes a regular site here on Saturday and Sunday mornings for those who get up early enough for more productive undertakings.

Oh yeah, some metally challenged dude felt it necessary to tell me how much I looked like Jerry Lee Lewis today. I told him thanks, I'll take it as a complement up to and ending with the whole "cousin thing." At that point, I'll take it as an insult. He wasn't sure how to react to that.