top 5 tips for rainbow climbers

I think I will make this the beginning of a customized top 5 series. So let’s begin.

1. Pick your goal very carefully

Your precise goal is important determines your method. Are you literally going to climb? Or is your goal just getting to the other side?

To get to the other side consider the following: bribing a leprechaun (the .ro version of rainbow climbing), renting a flying horse (available in Pipera for just 50 eu/30′), befriending ET (check Facebook & Twitter), getting a job with NASA (they’re hiring monkeys).

If you want to climb be sure to bring a very colorful pickaxe, a lucky horseshoe, sweat pants & peanuts. Also, loads of colored shoelaces.

2. Bring someone along

You’re not going to be able to carry the pot of gold all by yourself. So promise to share the profits with someone. Note: do not do business with friends or relatives – they whine.

3. Practice imagination

If you’re a wannabe yuppy looking for a quick way to get rich… you found it. But chances you’ll find a stable rainbow are about as likely as your grandma standing on one foot on the head of a stripper that just bounced from a cake.

That’s why be sure to watch a lot of cartoons & take notes. Also, get on a strict diet. Avoid chemicals (yes, including drugs) & alcohol. Actually, just go into a de-populated forest with nothing to eat or drink for about 4 days and you’ll be all set. Because you’re worth it!

4. Wear a hard hat

Rainbows go up pretty high so there’s a bigger chance that a flying pig will poop on you.

5. Pee before you leave

Peeing on a rainbow is frowned upon. So make sure to go before you go.

Now go out there and whoop some leprechaun ass!

Si in incheiere un moment special pentru toti baietii de la scara B:

Veioza CURCUBEU!

Fantastic!

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries, To Dos , cateri, climb, curcubeu, fiction, flying pigs, how to, imagination, leprechaun, pot of gold, rainbow, tips, top 5, veioza

what do we look for in music?

I’m kind of geeky and high school-ish about music. That attitude sort of stuck with me, that if I’m going to like someone I have to, at some level, respect their personal choice in music. 

And falling in love with Bob Dylan made it all that harder. I’ve got a thing for lyric-d music. The real chemistry doesn’t go on between my mind and the music most of the time, but relies on the lyrics. I just have to feel that music comes from one other real person, flesh and blood, warm as well. That’s why I don’t go for synthesized stuff all that much. It doesn’t seem to be real enough.

Still, there are other things that click. And all in all, it’s both the lyrics and the music mixed elegantly. In a way I can respect and relate to. Anyway, aside from Dylan, whose discography I could add here, here’s a list of my out of the line favorites: 

 

The Cat Empire – The lost song

 

Elis Regina & Tom Jobim – Aguas de marco

 

Nina Simone – Here comes the sun (Beatles cover)

 

Coco Rosie – Werewolf

 

Gotan Project – Santa Maria

 

Decemberists – Here I dreamt I was an architect

 

And a group favorite: Santogold – Shove it (featured in Jay-Z’s Brooklyn, we go hard)

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , best, choice, music, preference, selection, top

it’s BLU

Haven’t got the chance to do any research on BLU yet but here’s a sample of his art. I’ll address his art a bit more extensively in the next couple of days, but this is the best I can do right now. By the way, the first clip gets interesting around second 40 and will render you speechless. If Dali, Ionesco and Sorescu had a baby all together, it couldn’t have done better. 

The second one is more about the outcome.

Artist blog here and website here.

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , animation, berlin wall, blu, graffiti, muto

The Anecdote of the Jar

… by Wallace Stevens

 

I placed a jar in Tennessee,

And round it was, upon a hill.

It made the slovenly wilderness

Surround that hill.

 

The wilderness rose up to it,

And sprawled around, no longer wild.

The jar was round upon the ground

And tall and of a port in air.

 

It took dominion everywhere.

The jar was gray and bare.

It did not give of bird or bush,

Like nothing else in Tennessee.

 

I discovered the lovely poem in Kai Hammermeister’s book ‘The German Aesthetic Tradition’ (p. 180) . His writing is wonderfully clear. In a note he also thanks Richard Rorty for having pointed out the poem. 

Download the book here.

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , aesthetics, anecdote, book, jar, kai hammermeister, poem, wallace stevens

a best of Obama media

Well, he was after all the first 2.0 candidate in history and though I didn’t manage to keep up with his campaign entirely when it was going on, I though of looking back at a few things. Because this election spurred the most media in history and benefited from everything 2.0 communication has to offer. Now, due to the extensive discussions on this subject, I just wanted to share with you my favorite pro-Obama videos, via YouTube. 

3rd place – I got a crush… on Obama – by Obama Girl – because of the underlying satire on popular r’n'b

2nd place – Obama is here – by Ludacris – because it’s just cool

1st place - Cocoa Tea’s Barack Obama Reggae Song & Video – because it’s the funniest clip on the subject and actually, the most veridic display of how black communities around the globe have responded. And quote:

“It is not Hillary Clinton (Obama!)

and it is not John McCain (Obama!)
It is not Chuck Norris (Obama!),
And I know it’s not John Wayne (Obama!),
It is not the one Rambo (Obama!),
And it is not the Terminator (Obama!),
But a new trendsetter (Obama!),
Him hottin’ up the whole America”

“Well it’s no joke it’s a fact,

We’re gonna paint all the white house black (Obama!)”

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , coco tea, girl, ludacris, obama, rap, reggae, song, white house

les animations that will make you smile

I loved these soon as I laid eyes on them. They’re pretty, funny, sarcastic, fairly absurd and very witty. My favorite one is the first one, but each of them has something particular and well worth a watch. Now… I know the French are known to be disagreeable at times but we all know that there are still some things that they’re damn good at. Most of those things are short… but we all do the best with what we have. Lemons and lemonade, that sort of thing.

Enjoy and hope you love’em as much as I do. 

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , animation, avez vous deja vu, baskervilles, bruits, chameleon, crime, dentiste, eau, film historique, french, futur, legumes, lochness, magasin, piano, poids, visages, yeti

crossword cartoons

This is by one of the most talented people I know and my best friend. He used to do this in high school during class. And in return we would bake pancakes at my place. We had a lovely thing going there. 

Anyway, if anyone wants to see more of these or get in contact with him, let me know. 

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , cartoons, gabi serban, illustration

a short history of hip-hop in video

I’ve been getting into hip-hop as of late, a bit of schooling ’bout it helped since I was clueless before. Anyway, made this up so some of you could avoid that. 

My advice would be you start with Gang Starr’s ‘You know my steez’. It’s what got me into it and still my personal favorite.

1991 – Tim Dog – Penicilin on wax – Fuck Compton

1992 – Gang Starr – Daily Motion – The Illest brother

1992 – Dr. Dre – The Chronic - Nuthin’ but a ‘G’ thang

1993 – Wu-Tang – Enter the Wu-Tang (36 chambers) – Protect ya neck

1993 – KRS-One – Return of the Boom Bap – Sound of da police

1994 – Gang Starr – Hard to Earn – Code of the streets

1994 – Nas – Illmatic – Memory Lane

1995 – Mobb Deep –  The Infamous – Shook ones Pt. 2

1996 – The Fugees – The Score – The Mask

1997 – Notorious B.I.G – Life after Death – You’re nobody ’till somebody kills you

1998 – Gang Starr – Moment of truth – You know my steez

1999 – Mos Def – Black on both sides – Umi Says

 

And for what’s been up on the Romanian scene, here’s Kazi Ploae & Bean – Wake up. And quote: ‘Nu mai taia copacii coae, respiram acelasi aer!’

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , 90s, best, best of, decisive, dre, evolution, fugees, gang starr, hip-hop, history of hip-hop, important, kazi ploae, krs-one, mobb deep, notorious, relevant, wu-tang

if you’re romanian… watch this

This is not only extremely interesting to anyone that wonders about the growth of the web and the youtube phenomenon… but the example used by the speaker is O-zone. Yup, Dragostea din tei people, used to exemplify the power of new media channels, and the titan that is youtube… by an anthropologist, at the… Library of Congress, in 2008. 

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , anthropology, dragostea din tei, evolution, growth, numa numa, o-zone, web, youtube

Stop being so….

Filed under: Pleasant discoveries , adverstising, commercial, ikea