Cindylove
I love you, man.
Uttered (to Cindy) in the manner of one dude to another dude, circa 1971.
Who’s this??
Do I smell beer farts?
Here comes a flocker: Lucy Foley
Hello. My name is Lucy and I have stories.
I am from Ireland and I get around. I’m a writer, photographer and singer, and when things are going well I am actually doing these things, sometimes combining them together. You can see a little flavour sachet of my stuff over at Here Comes Lucy. I blog at Lucy Takes Off, and as of today, here at Clusterflock.
So last Saturday morning I woke up in Brooklyn, and I’m still here. This past year I’ve been living in New York, in Clare, Ireland and in Barcelona, and moving around a lot has become native to me.
My home in Brooklyn is a house on the edge of downtown Brooklyn and Park Slope that has my bloke’s recording studio on the ground floor and our living space upstairs. It’s quite a big house. We mostly play all day. There’s a hole in the roof and it goes drip drip drip when it rains heavily.
There are more animals in Clare than in New York, not counting the Brooklyn roof goats, of course. Clare also has more trees and wild grasses and fast moving water, matched in New York only by the cock-a-roaches that I sometimes squash with my bare fingers, and the humans who think at the speed of light. Oh, life is good. This city is becoming more local to me, and it feels like home, one of them at least.
Lately I’m busy doing things I don’t usually do. Things like writing proposals and making applications and sending things off in the post and giving people my business card. This feels good.
I am interested in the uncomfortable silence, the awkward social moment, the laugh, the celebration, the wait, the human ache. I’m interested in these things because they seem to me to be at the core of what it is to be human, and in exploring where they point.
Prenuptial clusterflockstock
Two things happened in Chicago today.
Amanda Mae Meyncke and Sheila Ryan plighted their troth.
And Cooper “Foxy” Renner increased his fan base by 100 per cent.
Damned little fox
Damned little fox
Why can’t you poop
Like a man in a box?
Wishin’ and Hopin’
and bound and determined. I’m in Chicago tomorrow. Amanda Mae is in Chicago through tomorrow. And we will rendezvous. I hope. If only for a hour or two. And have the bestest fun.
And.
I saved Cooper Renner’s recording of his ditty “Fox Shite”. “Foxy” Renner recorded it onto my voicemail. I want to play it for Amanda Mae.
(Lucy started it.)
Meet Lyle
Lyle (son of Lloyd) is a very special barn cat who tangled with some sort of canine—coyote we suspect—and didn’t fare well in the outcome. I found Lyle at the barn one Sunday evening with two dime-sized puncture wounds around his right shoulder and two dime-sized puncture wounds around his left shoulder, one featuring an egg-sized pocket of infection. The episode apparently happened several days earlier and by the time I found him, Lyle was near dead. I took him home, cleaned him up, and got him to the Splendid Vet first thing the next morning.
Gmail Chat Nugget (20 August 2008)
Amanda Mae: You know you sound like a crazy person, right?
Sheila: Oh, yes. It’s all part of the persona.
Amanda Mae: It’s totally working.
Vacation Eats 3
Our first night on the road, we stopped at the Park Vista Motel on the Blue Ridge Parkway. It was after nine and the restaurant was closed, but Carol brought club sandwiches to our room and asked if we would pay for them at breakfast. I was really hungry so didn’t take pictures of the sandwiches. Andrew learned about old TVs with rabbit ears, on-off knobs for power and volume, plus this thing we called a “UHF” knob. In the morning, he explained to me that the TV reception improves or degrades based on where the hair dryer was pointed. Who knew?
This is Carol right after she heard an empty coffee cup touch its saucer.
Erotic Magic Workshop
There’ll be workshops, after a fashion, at clusterflockstock, and this is by way of “drumming up” interest in a “workshop” I plan to offer.
“Content” is still “in development”, but I have privately shared with a couple of my fellow ‘flockers a description of my newly invented “Gettin’ It On Ritual” (the core of my Erotic Magic Workshop), and responses have been positive. To share the details in a public forum would only cheapen and coarsen something already crude and vulgar, so I invite those of you planning to attend clusterflockstock to “pencil in” my Erotic Magic Workshop.
Exact time and location will be announced at the event itself when I holler, “Hey, y’all, I’m fixin’ to show my Gettin’ It On Ritual! . . . (Yeah, that’s okay. If you’re still workin’ on your barbecue, just bring it with you.)”
Meet the Flockers: Mike Dresser
Howdy, folks. I’m Mike Dresser. Clusterflock has been a place I’ve come of late to find good cheer, good art, good ideas, and–well, just good. I’m looking forward to giving back some of the same.
A bit about me. I’m a fifth generation Floridian, the product of a charter fishing boat captain father and a world-traveling music teacher mother. It was a mixed up sort of upbringing: grits and ballet. I moved a whole 20 miles down the road to study music theory at Stetson University (DeLand, FL). Bought my first car there, paid for by playing piano at a cocktail lounge and a Baptist church. After graduation, I tried on a Real Career for a while; I’m still looking for a t-shirt that says “Library School Dropout”.
I’m currently living in Orlando, FL. I gig a little, cook a lot, take some photos, and maintain my two cats in style (Ringo and Binx). I listen to NPR, alternately laughing and crying at the state of this world of ours. Friends mock my affliction of celebrity face blindness: I can’t tell a Gregory Peck from an Alec Baldwin, and more than once I’ve lauded the It’s a Wonderful Life performance of Jerry Lewis. Like playing the guitar, this is one of those things I’ll never do well, and I’ve made my peace. I’ll talk your ear off about walkable cities and urban planning. The only long term goal of which I am certain is to do a bit of good, for myself and others.
It’s a pleasure to join y’all.
Meet the Flockers: Amanda Mae Meyncke
I am the commenter formerly known as jandek. One day I believe someone asked “Dear Clusterflock, what is your fulltime job?” and it struck me that it would be funny if Jandek answered the question. Things sort of kept going from there.
I live just outside Los Angeles, I just graduated from a small private university with a B. A. in Film and Radio Production. I spent most of my time in college designing and taking small classes on Flannery O’Connor. This year, I had made plans to move to Iceland, and to work for NPR, but as of right now, neither of those things have happened.
Los Angeles is wonderful, and I couldn’t hope to live in a better town. I mean that.
I screenprint, embroider, sew, karaoke, produce radio segments now and then, freelance write, garden occasionally, and I’m excited to be a part of your lives, and loves.
This is me looking serious… Seriously awesome!
on the verge
Meet the Flockers: Jonathan McNicol
Okay, let’s see. I was born at 5:15pm on February 4, 1978, in Schenectady, New York, which means three things:
- I’m an Aquarius.
- I was born right at the beginning of the Blizzard of ‘78 (which my mom would tell you has a list of meanings of its own).
- I’m awfully excited to see Charlie Kaufman’s new movie (though that likely would’ve been the case either way).
it’s only — a year — a-way!
Y’all. We’re a year away from clusterflockstock.
Juvenilia, circa 1970-71
Western Park Advertiser insert: Targeted marketing.
(Courtesy Steve Humphreys Collection.)
Eh, Sheila, that’s aspersions, not dispersions.
meet the flockers: Wil Freeborn
I’m going to keep this intro really short, I’m not too good at writing being more of a visual kind. I’m a designer working in Glasgow, Scotland. I’m looking forward to Spring so I can get out and about and draw more. At the moment there’s a lot of gales (90mph winds) which makes drawing outside a bit tricky.
Hopefully I’ll put a sketch up here every week.
You can find stuff I do over at ghostschool.
see the flockers: michael ‘vagrant thinker’ smith
These photos were picked out by my loving wife who said they best captured my personality - since she is mostly responsible for everything good about me, I’m posting them.
meet the flockers: jeff ventura
I’ll begin by saying that nobody has EVER called me Ace, Jesse or Ventura County. Nobody. So if you hurry, you can be the first to stake a claim way up high in the creative troposphere.
I am 38 years old, although I am told that will change next week on March 16th. I am a Pisces, which is a fish, which is stupid. It’s because of this incredibly lame draw in the astrological lottery that I’ve become very left brained and view the world as a logical, knowable system. As a result of this wiring, I forgive no mystical endeavor. Had I gotten the lion, or even that crazy archer guy, well, then I might be different. Whatever. Their loss.
I am married and have a three and a half year old son named Marc. My son surprises me every day, and I still haven’t gotten used to what a sponge he is. Just this morning, as I cut up his double-chocolate Pop-Tart, he told me that my car is two-wheel-drive. And then, he added after taking a sip of milk, rear-wheel-drive.
Hell yes.
meet the flockers: michael smith
First, let me say, as far as I know, I’m related to no other Smith involved with this flock.
Second, let me say, I’m here because, as frightening as it is, this flock is me and I am this flock.
Now for the fun stuff:
I was born and raised in the greatest state in the nation, California (no offense to other states, this is purely an opinion based on very little evidence and an affinity for the ocean and sunshine); I have never surfed. Today, I live in Sacramento, 2 hours from the ocean and 2 hours from Tahoe.
At this point I’m in my late 20’s and I work a real, 40 hour a week, job serving the man as a manager of the people. My job doesn’t define me.
It would be wonderful for me to say I’m a writer and list all of the wonderful novels and stories I’ve had published, but instead I will say I’m a writer and I have a wonderful list of nearly finished novels and stories sitting in a folder on my desktop labeled, ‘best cellar.’
This is the most difficult thing I’ve ever written.
More facts: I have a BA in Government, my favorite number is 1009, I don’t eat meat anymore (I don’t really miss it either), and I like food.
If you’d like you can find out more about me you can piece it together at my personal blog where I post as the Vagrant Thinker.
See The Flockers: Mau Sandoval
Me and my favorite person!
Meet the Flockers: Kathy Hilen-Smith
I am terribly flattered Deron has asked me to join the flock. I am the Smith formerly known as Kathy Smith, but because Deron invited me to post here, I’ve decided to resuscitate my duonym, Kathy Hilen-Smith.
Like the Mercedes Ruehl character in Terry Gilliam’s The Fisher King [Anne Napolitano], I am not a modern woman. I’m not a hyphenator by choice, but I married a Smith, so try to understand. Before I contribute content relative to topics of personal interest to clusterflock, I want to take steps to ensure I will not be mistaken for some other ‘Kathy Smith’ like that Fitness Nazi, Kathy Smith. She’s creepy. The hyphenated me will never be confused with Maryland Calvert County Circuit Court Clerk Kathy Smith, or the Columbia College Director of Student Success/Matriculation Kathy Smith, or any of the other Kathy Smiths whose interests and opinions may or may not reflect my own.
Kathy Hilen-Smith is many things including: happy wife of Michael Grant Smith and mother of Andrew *challenging teenager* Smith. Additional passions include Morgan horses, other horses, dogs and cats (in that order). Next: photography, poetry, art, fiction, history, politics.
See the Flockers: Kathy Hilen-Smith
Keeneland the day after the ‘07 Derby
See the Flockers’ Kitchens: India
Taken back in June. Yes, those are cake pans heaped in the dish drainer.
Meet the Flockers: Mau Sandoval
Hola!
My name is Mauricio Sandoval. Born in 1975 in Mexico City, Mexico. Lived there for almost 25 years. In 2000, after finishing college, I moved to the United States… ever since, living in beautiful MinneSnowta where I learned to live my whole year with only to seasons: Winter and Construction.
Around 1995 my friends and family started to call me Mau… it sounds like saying ‘Now’. That was not the only time I lost part of my name… When I became a U.S. Citizen I lost my second last name: Duran. I don’t have a middle name, I never had one.
I am married to this awesome gal I met back in 2001, her name is Tracey. She has the biggest heart ever and I know she’s the only one that could tolerate my geeky splurges… you know… computers, cameras, et cetera, bundled with long long hours spent in front of the computer.
In February, 2007, we became proud parents of Ben… the coolest and handsomest kid ever!!! He’s definitely changed our lives forever.
I am a hopeless geek drawn with everything that is enclosed in <html tags>, and files that end in .css. I currently hold a Sr. UI Designer position, but I have been a web developer for most of the time I’ve been here in the U.S. I have a personal website/blog and another site that hopes to become a business site for any new web design endeavors.
Besides web stuff, I enjoy music, movies, and a few years ago, I found a deep interest in photography.
Thanks to Deron for giving me the opportunity to become part of this awesome forum.
Since my employer uses WebSense and most of my favorite blogs (including this one) are blocked by the darn thing, I get paid to work from 7 to 4, I won’t be able to post during the day, but I will keep track of other Flockers’ posts via beautiful Google Reader.
Meet the Flockers: Sean Salmon
Hello. My name is Sean Salmon and I am a new clusterflock-er. I come here via the wonderful Mary Jeys and the generosity of Deron to give me a little space to contribute.
I am a recovering Architect and currently an Interaction Designer with an eye more towards concept design and development. I live in Jersey City NJ with Doris,my beyonce [fiance]. We have no cats and no dogs.
I have included a helpful timeline below:
1976 Born in NYC on October 3rd to Robert and Jutta, a toy designer and bookkeeper respectively. On my fathers side an Irish grandmother, and English-Welsh grandfather. My mother is from Germany, as are my maternal grandmother and grandfather, Omi and Opi. Live in a loft on Reade street. I’m a baby.