don't think twice, it's alright

my showcard, coming soon to a postbox near your porch, driveway, etc.

also, happy birthday to our buddy robert

what is thy bidding... my master

hahahahahaha

bumper stickers

have you hugged an O'Brien lately?

it's 11 am, do you know where the O'Brien's are?

O'Brien Happens

Wouldn't it be funny if schools had all the money they needed
and the O'Brien's had to have a bake sale to buy fighter planes?

My O'Brien beat up your honor student

Sports Chalet
I'd rather be O'Brien

kill your television with kindness

9:00 am

coffee for drinking
spray bottle w/water for disciplining kittens
crosby stills nash & young on ipod through hi-fi for listening

busy week. lots of media saturation right now. very busy taking in moving images
tuesday had a great episode of the fox show 'house' really good backstory on how he got his limp

wednesday brought the first half of the season finale of the abc show 'lost'. this show is freaking amazing because in reality there still no real way to figure out what's going to happen next. the main reason is a really fun one that isn't native to every tv show, the viewer and the characters have no idea what sort of rules are governing their existence. it's very '60's british sci-fi in that way ala 'the prisoner'

shortly after tv viewing on wednesday night, went down and saw the new star wars. there's lots of people blogging about it I am sure, so i won't really get into it. neadless to say, you should see it. star wars has had a lot to do with who i am, as nerdy as that sounds.

thursday night brought the season finale of 'the o.c.', my favorite show currently on television. pretty amazing episode, i'm not going to give spoilers, but you can check out the episode synopsis if you want to by going to the O.C. website and clicking on episode guide (flash). i'm really really interested to see what happens, in a 'dallas' who shot J.R.? sort of way. also, for those of you who weren't caught up with the O.C. when the season started, here's your chance to see season two before it comes out on DVD later on. fox is going to be doing what they are calling a 'summer season' of the O.C. replaying the episodes from the second season in order. this works out great for me, since i missed two or three of the episodes at the beginning this year because i was at work.

picked up a really cool vintage couch day before yesterday. amanda and i have been searching forever, and i really like this one a lot. it's a nice golden/greenish/brown color, a lot nicer than that actually sounds. it's really 60's and it's in great shape. in addition it is a hide-a-bed as was the couch we're replacing with it. i even switched out the mattresses because the one we had already was nicer. it looks so freakin sweet. i'll try and get some pictures up and running of stuff here soon. i need to be spending a lot of time in the studio right now though, so the blog isn't really much of a priority. but we'll see if i can get that taken care of.

anyway, gotta get back to the grind. i'm cleaning up the house today and making it all nice and shiny. mmmm shiny.....

iMatt v. 60.G

in search of...

so no money for my show yet, but it's all sorted. should (& i know i have said this before) be here tomorrow or the day after (friday). every paper has been signed, every dash an tittle... um done, no stone left unturned. once it's here, i can finally complete my show. that will be nice.

in news, i will unfortunately have to drive to oregon to get the trees that i need. usually they will ship them, but since it is the Oregon Department of Forestry that i am purchasing them from, they will not ship out of state. their trees are for the express use of growing only in oregon. someone better let God know, there could be seedlings creeping over the border somewhere... maybe they even have signs like we have here in california, but you know... with big trees dragging seedlings or something.

lots of stuff on the plate here in the O'Brien household. amanda and i are contemplating our next move as far as life is concerned. she doesn't really like her job at all. anyone who has talked to keith knows it's not a real barn burner of excitement down there, or even remotely rewarding. amanda has decided that she wants to teach english, the writing kind, not the speaking of to esl kids. this is a good choice considering that she received her degree in english writing.

the rub is trying to take classes to get her credential while still working full time. she was accepted into the program at biola last year, but didn't want to do it at that point. since her acceptance is valid for five years, she need only sign up for classes and get started. the problem is that all the classes start at 4:30pm, much too early for her to attend from Irvine. so we have been thinking about other options for her to become a teacher.

amanda's parents are both in education. her dad is an elementary school district superintendent and her mom is a first grade teacher in a nearby town. her dad also happens to be a professor for Point Loma in the satellite education program that they have in bakersfield. he could get her in at the drop of a hat, and there is a huge demand for high school english teachers in bakersfield. she would need only be enrolled in a credential program, and she would have a job. should we want to pursue this option, we have to make some fairly major choices, and probably do so within a week or two so that we could get the ball rolling.

positives:

amanda would get her credential, plus a year or two of work experience while i am preparing a large body of work to get myself into a masters of fine arts program somewhere. wherever i end up going to school, with her experience teaching, she would hopefully be able to find a position nearby while i am getting my masters.

lower cost of living, and a higher salary would be great for putting money away, paying off my school debt, and preparing to buy a house, have a kid or something, etc.

getting away from L.A.

potential to live in a really cool old arts and crafts style house near the old down town for less than we pay here in whittier for a semi-dumpy aparthouse.

negatives:

moving away from my base of friends, which is basically my family since i really don't have one.

lack of connections to the bakersfield area, outside of amanda's parents and her grandparents. in short, i don't know anyone

distance from an established group of friend artists, with connections to galleries, and their ability to critique and comment on my growing body of work.

no connections for employment. i'm planning on subbing up there, but nothing other than that. i don't really have any plow experience.

lack of things to do. bakersfield is growing, but it's all McMansions and malls. good if you like having lots and lots of california pizza kitchens and shit, but bad if you want to pick up a sweet pair of shoes, or a freshly released record on vinyl. also an apparent lack of art community, as far as i can tell with what little poking around i have done.

it's bakersfield. it's what my papa used to call 'the hubs of hell'. it's almost always one billion degrees there during the summer. i am from oregon. i am a doug fir tree, a sword fern. i will bake to a browned crackling, dried out shell of myself. heat makes me a terrible person, like a girl menstruating forever. i hate you, i hate everyone. get me a beer.

see i'm already getting cranky.

So those are the pros and cons, the positives and the negatives. i'm not sold one way or the other. on one hand, the move wouldn't be permanent. on the other hand, bakersfield is fun to visit because my in-laws have a sweet house with a pool, no because of the scenic beauty.

i would love to hear what you all think. i haven't really told anyone about this yet, since it's only been talked about for a couple of weeks between amanda and i. since you all are my family however, i want to know what you guys think. leave some thoughts/advice in the comments. also pray for amanda and i that we could make the decision that will be best for us as we grow in our marriage and careers.

i love you guys & girls (in a philadelphia sort of way, not pittsburgh)

church friday

going to church this fine friday morning with the reverend. it's been a while since i dropped the needle on this particular greatest hits, but it's worth the listen every single time. i mean check out the freakin cover! what kind of psuedo-jedi hand movement is that!!! this man must have The Force.

i think that i have a show space nailed down, just a few little details to fine-tune and everything will be in place. thanks for the prayers and encouragement, it means a lot. for those of you who have made it over to the studio, thanks! your being around and supporting me is such a blessing. no word on the funds from school yet, maybe monday. everything is going to be fine though, but i am going to have to cook like crazy once i've got the funds.

in fun for friday, here's a really fun set of games based on geography. this page has a couple of really sweet ones. i played 'locate the state' and correctly picked all 50 states in 103 seconds, and it probably would have been faster if i could have used a mouse instead of my laptop. i also played 'place the state - advanced' and got 70% accuracy with an average error of only 81 miles. try that on for size. have fun!

{thanks boingboing!

monadnock

work on the show is coming along well. much more to be seen than in the photos below. i'm really excited about this project. the guys that were at bible study know about my woes, buut here's a couple of prayer requests for those guys and ladies who weren't there: i lost my show space last week. long story, pray that i will find a place to show that will be perfect. also pray that my money for my show is issued to me this week. also long story, just pray.

otherwise things are going great with my show. i am really excited to share my vision with you guys. i have had the wonderful opportunity to share in other people's projects, art shows, albums and writings, but i feels it's about time for me to put my two cents in. we talk about the arts (music, writing, fine art etc) so much that it's really nice to finally feel like i'm contirbuting something to cacophony. any time any of you want to check out my stuff in person, just drop me a line or give me a call and i would be happy to have you over to the studio for a cup of coffee and some tire-kicking.

the kittens are doing well, starting to eat a little solid food here and there. the little calico one is so cute, and tends to sit and look you in the face in a very inquizitive manner. very endearing. it will be hard to let these little ones go. the plan as of now is to take the little orange tabby (boy) to amanda's grandparents. there cat chucky just ran away, or got eaten by something, and they will need a new cat for their barn. we're also trying to get amanda's parents to take the little calico one, but nigel, their black lab might be a little bit too hyper. he's super nice, just doesn't know how to be gentle with a tiny kitten. the little siamese one we are going to keep with us. she's just too cute. thanks to andy for the phone cam pic.