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This Week:"Deborah", by Dave Edmunds
ALLTHINGSMIKE
TEN YEAR ANNIVERSARY: 05/01/2009
At
the most, I wanted AllThingsMike, my personal website, to be my legacy.
At the least, it is a "place" where I can enjoy looking at my
"artistic accomplishments" without the trappings of my career
or "real life".
It
was on May 1st, 1999 that I first ftp'd a page, my poem "bornagain"
to the internet. The
"original" AllThingsMike was part of the Homestead Community
back when hosting a website was pretty much free for all comers. The first
index page is now called the
"News Page" but I pretty much just keep it up for archival
sake. In 2001 I moved Allthingsmike to it's own server, and a "history"
of my pages can be found by using the
Internet Archive database.
The
site is ten years old, and now encompasses about a thousand pages of "electronic
art and literature". Divided into themed websites and sections, clickable
through the clouds at your right or the taskbar at the top of the page,
I am pretty much "re-inveinting" myself online, showcasing my
latent talents. Although a physical move during the fist few months of
2009 has prohibited me from updating a complete overhaul as planned for
the "celebration", I will begin to concentrate again now that
the anniversary date is finally here. Upcoming projects include Mike's
Video Blog #10: Movin' On Up, a video diary of my recent move, and the
addition of the 2009 page to the
ElectricPoetry website. I'm actually writing quite a few poems in
2009. which can presently be seen on my blog, WhenWordsCollide. in the
last half dozen or so
ElectricPoetry posts, including three themed posts for National Poetry
Month in April. So far, I've written a total of 14 poems in 2009.
As
the year 2008 wound to a close, the roommate I had prepared for in
Mike's Extreme Makeover decided he couldn't afford to live with me
anymore, and I was forced to find a new place to live, after 14 years
in the same house. I could have opted to look for another roommate, but
didn't want to be facing "roommate roulette" over the next few
years, especially since I am having a major operation upcoming.
I
cancelled the operation, and prepared for, and moved during the months
of January and February. There will be an upcoming Mike's
Video Blog showing the highlights of the move. Because the Betty Boop
Museum had to be completely dismantled, I took new photos of the museum
when after I set up the figurines in new displays and posted 199 of these
high quality photos in a new Webshots Gallery folder entitled "The
Betty Boop Museum 2009".
There
is also video footage for an upcoming video about the Betty Boop Museum
and my various collectibles.
The
last major site overhaul I completed before I had to physically move and
stopped updating was The Betty
Boop Pages. I overhauled the Composite
Section, and the Web
Images section, relegating the images which had been stagnating on
the front page of the site for over a year to their own gallery, and replacing
them with all new images, mixing new high quality photographic backgrounds
with all new posed images of the Danbury Mint Betty Boop figurines.
In
all, ten new composites are now featured on
The Betty Boop Pages. Although I did draw from new angled poses of
some of the figurines previously used in composites, like the "upskirt
Betty" pose used in the composite to the left with a newly colorized
skirt, most of the new work utilizes Betty Boops from my plate collection,
which haven't been used previously.
The
end of the year is always a time for increased activitiy here at AllThingsMike.
Since it's the dawn of the tenth anniversary year, there is even more
activity going on. A couple of weeks ago, I completely updated the ElectricPoetry
site, and for the past two weeks, I've turned my attention to MikeVideo.
Besides changing some of the page styles and making the snappy new graphic,
shown to the left, I've added year pages like on
ElectricPoetry, and created a couple of new "Feature Pages".
One of the files streaming from the
Selling Sex Page was incomplete (for about three years!) and I've
uploaded the complete file (which took me some time to find)
While
the site is updated at least a couple of times a year, when I'm making
more videos, I tend to update in "blocks", so the site remained
unchanged for a while, with "Big Wednesday Dreams", created
in Dec. 2007, as the "latest" video. Now I've updated and redesigned
the front page of the site, so that my latest couple of videos are shown
there, and then all other videos for the year are collected on their own
year pages.
2004, 2005,
2006,
2007, and 2008
are online. I've listed in each section all the instances where the videos
are online, either on YouTube or Xanga and also supply a link to the "Director's
Commntary " pages from my blog for most of the videos.
New
videos showcased on the
main page include "L.A. Dreams",
from November, and "Faire Music", the very fist "test video"
for the more ambitious 2005 project, "Renaissance Day", soon
to have it's own "Feature Page". The latest "Feature Page"
contains the three
"ElvisMovies" music mashup videos. It was a lot of work,
and I still have to update the style of the History
and Video
Capture sections to match the style of the rest of the site, but all
in all, this past couple of weeks has seen a major overhaul of MikeVideo
and were very productive. .
SAN
PEDRO CLOUDSCAPES: THANKSGIVING DAY 2008
Thanksgiving
dawned bright and beautiful after a rainstorm drenched the southland,
and I took my camera on a short jaunt to San Pedro, resulting in over
100 photos filled with wonderful cloudscapes in the Webshots Folder "Thanksgiving
Cloudscapes in San Pedro." The latter part of the year is filling
my muse with new projects all the time, which is fitting since I will
probably be a bit housebound after the hip replacement replacement operation.
In
the meantime, join me on numerous photo expeditions during the holiday
season 2008, including this impromptou joyride.
While
driving down Gaffey Street in search of images like
this one, I was pulled over by police because I was taking photos
in a no parking area by a government compound. I was let go with a warning,
but this proves to how great lengths the Mikester will go to get an interesting
photograph.
May
of 2009 marks the 10th anniversary of this website. Section by section,
I intend to completely updatre the complete website by that time. After
a long absence updating anything except the blog,
owing to the problems I had with ftp after moving my complete site to
another server in August, I am in the midst of a whirl of activity right
now.
Each
Decades page and most of the Year pages on the
ElectricPoetry website have been updated. New transcriptioins have
been added to
1981 and
1983. There are only a dozen or so poems to transcribe and then all
of the Eighties poetry will be fully posted on the internet. Some new
transcriptions have also been added to the Nineties
section completing all poetry for that decade.
The
"Operations" series on my blog, WhenWordsCollide,
has a current edition with my new essay series, "A Leg to Stand
On", started in June 2008 when my doctor referred me to an orthopedic
specialist who is going to eventually give my broken sixteen year old
left hip replacement a replacement. Since this operation is not all
that common, since older folks usually have hip replacements in the
first place,and I had mine back in the early 90s, I am documenting the
sometimes time consuming process of seeing doctors, taking drugs, and
hobbling about on crutches for almost six months.
After
the operation is performed, hopefully sooner than later, I will keep
readers up to date with my progress. I've gone through the hip replacement
process before, but this is brand new, since each replacement replacement
is an entirely different procedure, depending upon the patient.
<
size="3">L.A. DREAMS PROJECT
11/08
Even
though I've been on crutches since late summer, waiting for an operation
to be scheduled to replace my broken hip replacement, I started to get
a little bit of cabin fever by staying home, and embarked on another photo
expedition series to downtown L.A. in November.The cemterpiece of my L.A.
Dreams project is the new MikeVideo internet movie slideshow called L.A.
Dreams, available on YouTube
and Xanga
Video. It is a mix of my photos of downtown L.A. dating back to 2004,
with special emphasis on the high quality photos I took in beautiful weather
in early November mixed with video footage shot over a wide period of
time on expeditions to L.A.Music is a mashup of Los Angeles themed groups
and songs.
May
brought three major projects, and I felt the year at it's half way point
was one of the more productiive in memory. Then "real life"
reared it's ugly head and Mike's online world took a backseat to the aforementioned
real one. In July, longtime friend and roommate Joel
Birney passed away. I also found out that my 16 year old hip
replacement needed to be replaced.
Not
known to leave my videoblogging skills dormant when there is any chance
of being creative, even though I stopped the Hollywood Project detailed
below, I put together the three part video series "Mike's Extreme
Makeover", showing the PART
ONE , PART
TWO, and PART
THREE together comprise a 30 minute program which takes a "reality
show" approach to how I cleaned up my house after Joel's death, and
prepared for the arrival of a new roommate. There is also a PhotoPost
on my blog with high quality photos taken of the makeover.
A
blog announcing the arrival in August of new roommate Mike Hatt can be
found HERE.
THE
HOLLYWOOD PROJECT 7/08
There
are 252 photos in the
Hollywood: The Sign, Beachwood Estates,and Cemetary folder on Webshots.
This is an "unfinished project" which was began scant days before
my roommate passed away after a long battle with colon cancer. I never
finished the project, and didn't shoot any video, but the material shot
provided two Photoposts on the blog and the Webshots folder. I still plan
on returning to the Hollywood Forever Cemetary to take the tour, so I
can get more photos of the "graves of the famous", including
Rudolph Valentino and Cecil B. DeMille. The photo composite to the left
is the logo header for the blog series, and includes an enlarged version
of the sign photo, plus additions of car photos from other projects. The
Chrysler on the left is one of my models.
Back
in the summer of 2004, when I was using the still feature in the videocamera,
I shot two Webshots Galleries full of photos along Hollywood Blvd. (ONE
and TWO)
These galleries are among my most visited on Webshots. I plan to get up
to Hollywood Blvd again with the new camera, but plans were stifled after
the death of my roommate, followed by the news that I need to use crutches
because of my broken hip replacement.
THE
JACARANDA PROJECT 5/08
The
purple Haze of jacaranda flowers covers Southern California in the Spring.
An abundance of blooms showed up on the weekend of May 10th and I began
my photo excursions the next weekend. On May 16th in Long Beach and May
18th in Pasadena, I photographed dozens of the beautifully flowering jacaranda
trees and am displaying the photos in the Webshots Folders Purple
Pulchritude One (Long Beach) and
Purple Pulchritude Two (Pasadena) There is also a selection of the
better photos in the
May 21st PhotoPost on WhenWordsCollide
RENAISSANCE
DAY MUSIC AND COMEDY 5/08
Pirates,
buccanneers, wenches, lords, and ladies populate the yearly Southern California
Renaissance Faire which occurs in the Santa Fe Dam Recreation Area in
Irwindale in the Spring. I went this year on the last day of the Faire,
May 18th, and the weather was oppressively hot.
Although
I didn't get a lot of varied footage or photos this year, since I left
early, I did get almost the complete performances of the Poxy Boggards
bawdy men's choral group, and magician, comic and juggler Broon, who put
on a good show this year. Both performances are in the MikeVideo internet
movie
Renaissance Day 2008.
CULVER
CITY KUSTOMS PROJECT 5/08
One
of the Thursday Calendar entertainment choices in the Los Angeles Times
was the 2008 edition of the George Barris "Cruisin' Back the Fifties"
car show in Culver City. Only a few miles north of L.A., I hauled both cameras up to the show and spent three or four
hours taking both photos and video of the various classic custom cars,
both from the George Barris studio, and in competition. It was slightly
overcast, but the shining paint jobs are still clearly displayed on these
beauteous automobiles. The photography was taken on May 10th. The Webshots
Folder, "Culver
City Kustoms" with 234 photos, was added later that night.
The MikeVideo Internet Movie, "Culver City Kustoms" was added
toXanga Video and YouTube
on the 12th, making this project one of the fastest to get to the internet
in both photo and video versions so soon after planning and shooting.
Read
the Director's Commentary on WhenWordsCollide.
THE
SILVER LAKE STEPS PROJECT 04/08-5/08
On
May 1st came the Mikester's fifty fifth birthday, and to celebrate, quite
a few creative endeavors were started. Planned and shot in mid March,
the Silver Lake Steps Project resulted in a couple of Webshots folders.
Silver Lake Steps One with 102 images and Silver
Lake Steps Two with 160 images added on May 11th. Intrigued
with a Los Angeles Times article about the over 50 public staircases in
the Los Angeles suburb of Silver Lake, Mike printed out a list from the
internet and took both still and video camera up into the hills of Silver
Lake looking for staircases. Covered are the famous Music Box Steps, the Cove, Landa, and
the Micheltorena steps. There is also internet movie footage incorporated
into the eighth edition of Mike's Video Blog, available on both Xanga
Video and YouTube.
The video blog is 13:03 and takes the viewer along on the hike with Mike,
from planning, driving to, and execution of the hike up three famous staircases.
Read the Director's Commentary on the blog.
I
have only made eight
"Mike's Video Blogs" since February of 2006, but each one
is lavish, with travel, music, and narration covering a variety of places
and events. The most ambitious is Mike's Video Blog #6,"Almost
Homeless", which encompasses three separate "chapters"
to document the renovation of my rented house, and then the shocking eviction,
and eventual redemption which followed.
I've
been blessed with a charmed life, unaffected by the tragedy and
mistrust which govern most lives. My life has been present during
a rather turbulent time from a historical perspective, and I'm
attempting to make sense of it all on this website. My electronic
experiment in art is always expanding, to
chart the course of this life, and the lives of my fellow
humans trapped like me in a reality they never dreamed up or asked
for.
My
actual "life" began in 1953, but the website, while
it would attempt to chart that life, would really start to chart
the current, or "electronic life." It all started back
in 1999, when I hit the age of 46, and developed an interest in
the power of the computer to bring people together over the internet.
I wanted to document my words, my art, my musings, and felt that
the promise of the internet to enhance and stimulate creativity
and the desire to create would eventually bring my art and musings
to the masses, and in return, help my to find the muse which would
stimulate all my misdirected energy into a "webpresence".
I signed on to the budding GeoCities and Homestead web hositing
sites (The charge was "free" in 1999) and began creating
this "webpresence". My original overblown intentions
were to archive my "complete
works", poems and prose dating back over thirty years.
In addition, I wanted to present "art" created with
imaging programs and display my
"video" movies.
The
poetry never completely got transcribed, but the attempt is being
made again. In 2004, I began the second incarnation of the ElectricPoetry
website, and have transcribed a good many of my nearly 700 pieces
of poetry written from 1967 to the present.
I
was too far ahead of the curve with the video yearnings. The digital
videocamera I purchased was in 1999. It is ancient by digital
standards and does not input digitally to the computer. I got
it before firewire and USB. I only recently purchased a video
camera with a digital input for the computer. This has fueled
my love of photography and videomaking. Photography is featured
on my
Webshots Gallery, and is always being updated. Lately, the
"MikeVideo Internet Movies" and my latest video feature,
the "Video Blog" can be found on my YouTube
"channel".
The
many urges I have to write are never completely satiated, and
when I do write, which is seldom, the computer screen stares back
at me and laughs like those blank pieces of paper staring from
my typewriter so long ago. Now, thanks to a somewhat largish readership
for my every-other-daily blog, WhenWordsCollide on the Xanga service,
I am writing more than I have in a long time.
I keep paying for the privilege of keeping this site up and running,
however, and every year there are more promises to myself to add
some more content. When I began this present introduction, it
was late 2003. It is now well into 2005, and another probably
misdirected attempt is abrew to chronicle, to journal, to wax
poetic and to philosophize. The New Year always brings promise,
and I have always vowed not to break any promises. This year,
as I promised last year at this time, I feel the need to wirte,
to archive past writings, and to create art, in whatever form
it feels it has to take.
Also,
not to be forgotten, is my attempt to prophesize the Universal
Truths which will sometime take root in the Universal
Mind. This site grew considerably in 2004 and is slowly being
added to in 2005..
The
segmentation of the past forms of this website are slowly coalescing
into something else, especially as I seem to use the Blogger programs
like Xanga for the written word these days. If there are broken
links, I vow to fix them. If there is a purpose, I vow to soon
let myself know what it is. If I somehow, miraculously gain the
readership I crave, and if I somehow start writing like I have
vowed in the past, then perhaps I shall findl fulfillment. If
you, dear reader, feel like you want to journey with me, to the
past forms, the present musings, and the future of AllThingsMike,
then click one of the clouds on the right, and come with me.
MFN,poet,philosopher,fool
12.27.03 (perpetually updated, most recently 7.25.06)