Here is a look inside how sausage is made in California's Capitol. It may never be the most watched of the "Shit people say" videos, but for people who have worked in or around the capitol, many of these statements will sound familiar. I'm just happy to help out on a good way to get the Sacramento Press Club a little light-hearten exposure, while having fun with a very serious world.

Wine forward

When my brother returned from a trip to Europe a couple years ago, he gave me a wooden wine box with a wine from the region he visited. Given my affinity for vino -- and in this age when gift cards are the mindless gift of last resort -- I thought it was a thoughtful gift.

The wine and stately box was a double gift. A double gift that could should be shared again.

I purchased a nice California wine and placed it, along with a small notebook with a note outlining the box's history, in the case and passed it on to a worthy new caretaker. I hope it was passed along.

The thought of the box moving from home to home makes me smile. I wonder if it's been hiking, seen great sights, witnessed an engagement. But I'm left wondering where its been, what happy moments its enjoyed and where it is now.

How would you react if someone gifted you a handsome wooden wine box, but asked you to blog about the awesome wine experience and pass it along?

I need your feedback and advice. Is this a worthy project? Would anyone read such a blog? Is it a project for fun or profit?

Life coach by committee

In recent months, I've had two people I count as friends offer me their services as a life coach.
I've politely declined.
While the cost is the dominate issue, I must admit that part of me also feels I should be smart enough to life coach my own damn self.
It's a beautiful thought. But seldom practical for many of us. For whatever reason -- time, self-doubt, lack of tools -- we slip back into our bad habits or left life get in the way.
Life coaches are supposed to be for people who are falling apart.
Seldom sufficient, but most of us lean on one good friend or go life coach by committee.

Hands down, my college buddy Rufus has been my best unknowing life coach.
Rufus's brilliance is obscured by factors not entirely within his control, but he never stopped dreaming. The question with him is whether those factors would allow the great art within him to shine. I've tried to help him past those factors.

Meanwhile, he's pushed me to push past the factors that hold me back (apathy, complacency, self doubt). He knew me when I was the big fish and taking names.
During college I was the fearless editor of the student paper destined to be running shit. Feared and respected, if a tad pompous.
While he was never a scout, at my suggestion he also spent a summer working for me at a Boy Scout summer camp. As the program director, I was the No. 2 in command and chief entertainer for the camp which weekly hosted 200 middle school-aged kids.

Rufus pressed me to remember when we ruled shit. I'm active in the community and at work, but I'm not ashamed to say my star is not shining as bright. Professionally, I'm a small cog in the sick machine that is the newspaper business.

Personally, it's a long way back.
I'm taking baby steps.
For me success is capable, determined and focused enough to take the good ideas and turn them into action. It's often a long way from the good idea to execution. On my journey back to running shit sometime you have to celebrate the small victories like creating and handing out awards to random people, but worthy winners at the New Year I attended as a plus one. Or participating in the office holiday "canstruction" contest.

Thinking about when I was at my best, I realized I was always surrounded by capable, winning officers that made our collective vision come true.
In student government at Casa Roble, things got done because there was a team of people working together to plan a dance, build a float or throw a rally. At The Southern Digest the newspaper came together because Mike Wilson, Shamika Britt and Andre Jackson had my back.
I wish I had a firmer plan as I write this. But none-the-less I'm putting it out there: I'm looking for a team. Maybe two teams.
One I envision as a group of people who meet around a meal to discuss what they'd live to improve about their lives and then holding each other accountable.
Thousands of people -- mostly women gather to discuss other people's literary works. Why don't people gather to discuss your ideas, dreams, aspirations?
The idea is simple. On a regular basis, a group of people get together to bypass the bull shit and talk the dream they've held in the closet and the plot a path toward making it reality.

Beandeer can inspire holiday spirit

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Beandeer is the newsroom offering in the Sacramento Bee's inter-office canstruction contest.

With some reluctance, I'll admit that as a high school student leader I actually enjoyed decorating for school dances. I've always felt the urge to be involved, but my real run as a student leader began after my Freshman year in response to my good friend Kim Cantrell's urging.

Over the years, we also organized and decorated school floats, campus rallies and hallways. I was never much into the color scheme. For the most part, I let the ladies make all the subjective decisions. However, I did feel a sense of pride when we successfully turned an idea into reality. I felt really good when the dance was filled, people liked the decorations and we made a profit.

It was with some curiousness among work colleagues that I agreed to spearhead the newsroom's holiday canstruction effort. The publisher asked various departments within the paper to create can-based holiday displays. In my book, its the same deal, bringing the right people together to execute a vision.

The judging has not happened yet, but I feel good about our effort. I feel even better about this time-lapse video by Hector Amezcua of us putting him together.

Video captures whimsical fun of Burning Man 2011

After much delay, I've finished and uploaded my Burning Man video. With so much to see and do everyone's experience is undoubtedly different. This is a small slice of the sights and sounds of Burning Man 2011 Rites of Passage. With enough distance, I can hardly remember my listless dehydration at the tail end of the week. Burning Man is not for everyone, but clearly its for plenty. Enjoy.

And while you're here, I've also embedded my 2010 slide show.

Family fun beach camping

After much delay I finally got to work and finished my video of the summer Fletcher Camping trip to Harris Beach State Park on the Oregon coast. I hope you enjoy.



I originally cut a video using Avid's Studio 11. Frustrated is video format issues I turned again to Windows Live Movie Maker.

Two music idiots ask: "What the hell is dubstep anyway?"

"Dubtep is robot dinosaurs fighting with lasers," random guy at Burning Man.

Music is a big part of Burning Man. For reasons unknown to me, the vast majority of the offerings are various sorts of electronica. The meager live music offerings are dwarfed by large theme camps offering dj music. It's important to note that the Burning Man organization does not bring, host or promote any of the artists. It's all done by theme camps interesting in hosting a huge free dance party in the dessert.
For the first time, I was camped with a electronic music expert who alerted us electronic idiots on when the world famous artists will be spinning the latest dubstep.

Dubstep expert

As we came to learn, dubstep is all the rage. (If you aren't already, you should be playing the clip above). Following our music expert's instructions I listened to several artists people pay good money to hear including bassnector and Opiuo. That often meant lasting until 3 a.m. But while I knew they were spinning dubstep, I didn't have the foggiest idea what defined dubstep.
As we sat in the queue to leave Black Rock City after a week of excess, (exodus the bane of Burning Man) Princess Fussy Pants asked me, "What is dubstep anyway?"
"A series of beep and twerps," I replied, to a laugh. But what is dubstep really?
Given the fact that we had hours of mind sapping traffic to clear, we decided to ask our fellow automotiveinmates. Below is a list of responses from other waiting to leave the incredibility enjoyable and exhausting festival. Some went for humor, some aficionados gave us a clear thoughtful response.

• "Dubstep is robot dinosaurs fighting with lasers." 
• "You know when your in the jacuzzi and you put your head under water by the jet? That is dubstep."
• "Pitch driven base line -- kind of a wobble. Beeps and twerps are more electro house."
• "It's all about the whoop. Baseline of whoop, more dynamic that house or techno. Wah, wah, wah, wah."
• "drug music."
• "Don't know -- I'm not a fan."
• This one super knowledgeable, not so articulate fan said it has something to do with a "double oscillating base" related to reggae and two step -- hence the name. 
• "It's doing a hit of nitrous by the speakers."
• "70 beats per minute sounds like doom ... do dat -- doom doom do dat."

If that doesn't want to make you run out to shill out $100 to see bassnector spin I don't know what will. Please share your impressions of Dubstep or call me a idiot below.

Burning Man is for Doers

Burning Man participants bike near "The Man"

Amateurs try their hand at basic trapeze maneuvers 

A shot ski goes down in the middle of the desert.

Why I go to Burning Man

It's cliché to say Burning Man has to be experienced to be understood, but in many ways its true. (If a picture is worth a thousand words, how many words is experiencing it firsthand worth?)  That said, I will attempt to explain why I attend Burning Man.
People fit into one of two groups: watchers and doers.
Watchers will critique a flash mob, but won't organize one, show up to the costume party, but don't take risks and are the last ones to go skinny dipping.
I choose to be a doer.
I guess I've been a doer most of my life. I was more or less involved in student government since grade school, was a union official at work and have served on various boards throughout my adult life. I love that Burning Man celebrates doing. 
Burning Man is not a city. City's can sustain themselves for more than a week. But Burning Man is a community. A community of people that say yes, that take risks, that participate.
For those who know little of the annual week-long experiment in the Nevada desert, Burning Man invites attendee to shed their normal governors on what to wear and how to act. It turns the show or the festival inside out and asks the guests to be the show. Some invite world class disk jockeys to perform, some create a (free) full-functional bar (minus the bathroom), some teach acrobatics, others offer massages classes, other erect beautiful works of art.
Just about the only thing the event offers beyond structure, gatekeepers, port-a-potties, ice and a few classes is a large wood "Man" that of course burns.
One could run themselves ragged, trying to do a quarter of the pre-planned event. Conversely, one could stumble on the perfect day by setting out on your bike and exploring the a dozen or so of the unmapped, unscheduled events planned and executed by people just like me -- doers.   

Community access show step toward recapturing all-kicking of old

Sam Amick (left), Marcos Breton and Eric Hogue share a moment before taping Ed Fletcher's Access Sacramento Show on Sacramento's great arena debate. 

I hosted my second Access Sacramento show Thursday morning. It was "Meet the Press-"style news show on Sacramento's consideration of building a replacement arena. It some ways it's odd that I'm doing this. I don't have Comcast and I never watched free community content television. As my small small group of readers know, I've been a print news reporter for sometime. A dozen years professionally to be exact.

To over use a phrase it was interesting confluence of events that has me pretending I can produce and host television. I have done some multimedia reporting for my newspaper and I really enjoyed. Here is a link to somethings I've done, but that is a serious diversion. In the end, my apatite for doing it was more than theirs for it. By must accounts, I was holding up my end in terms of talent, but the Edventures didn't generate enough traffic and it was stopped before it really started. To be fair they were hyper labor intensive. Maybe I need a whole post on Edventures.
I embraced using skills I haven't used since high school and my early days of college.
The second tier of my confluence of events: Rufus. Rufus is one of my longest friends who happened to be crashing at my house until about six months ago. Rufus is a very private man so I'll have to let your mind wander for details on that subject. I can say that Rufus knew me most during my years as the forceful, innovative, ass-kicking editor of the student paper at my college the Southern Digest. Rufus pushed me to recapture a bit of the ass-kicking.
Along those lines, I'm making greater effort to execute some of my brilliant ideas. If I feel like an arena-focused panel discussion is good for public discourse, then find a way to get it done. It's a good place to start. Far too often we put our great ideas away because we don't think we're qualified, or have the money, or have the time.
Why shouldn't I get on stage as a standup comedian? Why shouldn't I start a non-profit? Why shouldn't I throw a street party?
The third event: Through my guild work, I met Ron Cooper from Access Sacramento. He was helpful and enthusiastic about the project I was proposing. In the end, that project never got off the ground. But eager for new programming, he asked me and my former guild vice chair Walt Yost if we were interested in hosting a show. It would be months before I took that leap.
It's not like I wasn't active over the last decade, I've been active with local National Brotherhood of Skier, the Urban League Young Professionals and the Guild. But I've always felt restrained, like my employer owned my good ideas. As layoff have become a twice yearly ritual, I've decided to forget holding back. Be respectful of your continued employment, but don't be so beholden to The Man as to let a good idea die.

About the show:

Three respected Sacramento voices discuss the woes of Power Balance Pavilion, rate Mayor Kevin Jonhson’s leadership and offer their predictions on the likelihood of success in efforts toward building a replacement sports and entertainment complex on an upcoming Access Sacramento show (Comcast Channel 17).
The panel consists of Marcos Breton, of the Sacramento Bee; Sam Amick, of SI.com; and Eric Hogue, of News Talk 1380. The show first airs at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 24 on Comcast 17 and will be streamed simultaneously at AccessSacramento.org.
The show News Forward is sponsored by The Sacramento Press Club and Access Sacramento. It’s hosted by The Bee’s Ed Fletcher.

Be your own judge but I think the show went off remarkably well considering the fact that what little television experience I had -- behind and in front of the camera  -- is a decade old. This was definitely one of those fake it until you make it situations. Let me know what you think, if you catch it.

Time crunch as show, Burning Man approach quickly.

With one day before I tape my Access Sacramento show, a week before I go camping with my family and 13 days before I go to Burning Man, its seems everything is stacked up. Any one of those would have been fine blog topics, but given my current time crunch I'll hardly devote as many words as any deserve.

Access Sacramento

I'm hosting and producing a "Meet the Press"-style panel discussion show on Sacramento's efforts to build a replacement arena.We tape Thursday. It's my second such effort. Each time I learn so much. I don't know what the future holds in this area but, I'm glad I'm doing it.

Camping

My brother and one of my nieces will be coming down from Seattle to camp with the Sacramento-base family. We meet in Oregon. It should be a great time.

Burning Man

Within hours of returning to Sacramento, I'm load up my playa gear and I'll make my way to the Black Rock dry lake bed for my third Burning Man. I'm incredibly excited but there is so much preparation to be done. Radical self-reliance, one of the 10 principles of Burning Man, meant it was time to build a better boombox.

Internet hos attack facebook

I promises to return to posting about important stuff. I have been making "plan b" efforts, but in the meantime enjoy this work of art from this internet slut. 

I'm "friend" people on facebook for three reasons I really know them, I really used to know them or they went to my high school or my college during my years. Yes the two latter exceptions are very broad, but I figure as a known high school and college figure from student government and the paper, there is a good chance I did know them, but forgot them. 

The one area I'm fairly restrictive in the facebook realm is work people flacks and such that I'm not on "drinking beer with" terms. My weakness in that area is hot chicks. But was you notice I message them to see if they are a robot. The odd this is Facebook has been fairly good at keeping the sluts out.

I'm still working, plan b conceived

It may not be evident by this blog, but I'm continuing to work toward the goals expressed earlier in this space.
I have what I'm calling "Plan B" and am quietly working to make the transition -- whenever it may come -- easier.
I may write more about that in some time, but for now I feel its best to keep it under my hat. Regardless, of future employment I'm determined to keep the side projects moving here is an update on a few things I'm been working on:

• My short film PINK needs some work, maybe a lot of work. After leaving it alone for a while I had the distance to really evaluate it. Something I don't think I really got before. Right now its a collection of some interesting scenes from an interesting story, but it doesn't really tell a story yet. There is no story arch. The question remains: can it be done in a 10 page short.
• ARENA. I've decided to tape another show for Access Sacramento on Sacramento's arena debate. The goal will be to do it before September. What I need now is a sponsoring organization that doesn't impinge my journalist integrity. 
• As noted before I dabble in video editing. The more and more Pinnacle Studio 11 fails me, the more convinced I need to become a Mac guy. I'm working on a longer multi-shot video, but here is the raw iphone video of by buddy Joe Boes singing You are my Sunshine. 
•