-Last night Reagan and I toned down her blob a bit. I kind of like the way that it turned out. Very clean and simple. Every time I tried to get fancy with it, Reagan, vetoed.

-The weather is supposed to continue to be super mild for the duration of the week. This means absolutely no excuses for not running outside. Tomorrow I will be up early anyway, moving the car. So, it just has to happen. I feel like if I can just break though this wall, and get back in a routine then it will be easier going forward. Why am I sharing this personal pep-talk? Accountability, I suppose.

Reagan and I had a very enjoyable weekend. In addition to the Piper visits, we paid a visit to Brooklyn Industries, so that Reagan could exchange one of her Christmas presents (above). Then, Saturday night we had a little get-together for Reagan’s birthday. It was a lot of fun. I ran to grab the camera, so I could get a picture of Reagan blowing out the candles. Let’s just say that the pic didn’t come out so great. I’m not going to post it on here. But you can check it out here, if you would like to see some photography skills at their finest.

The weather was absolutely beautiful on Sunday, which didn’t stop me from taking a 4 hour nap after church. We went for a quick walk in the evening then watched a movie. Pretty much textbook.

We had such an awesome visit with Piper this weekend. She was awake the whole time. We started her on the DC this weekend. Although, she had some trouble getting the lid of. We gave her a bath and combed her hair like Zach Efron (sp?). You can check out the rest of the pics here.

[photo by trevor Little]

-I missed out on the Red Bull Snowscraper event yesterday/last night. I don’t feel too bad about it, since it was way too cold to be standing around outside for a long period of time (and I was working, kind of late). There is a rumor that it is going to be open to the pubic, before they tear it down. Really? That would be pretty freaking awesome.

-Where I come out of the subway at Chambers, it is one of those floor to ceiling turnstiles, with the cage-looking bars that works like a one way revolving door. About 50% of the time, there is a sticker (when I say sticker, I mean an Avery address label with a message printed in Times New Roman, Bold), on which is printed “Amplify Love, Dissipate Hate.” Pretty profound. The MTA scrapes it off about twice a week, but it always re-appears. Thanks, who ever goes through the trouble to print those out and stick them on there, every week. Even when I see the little grey patch, where it was removed, I am reminded each morning of the phrase.

-I finished “TSAR,” last night and started 1776 this morning, during my commute. I have heard a lot of good things about David McCullough, and I can see why. For a purely historical book, “1776″ reads pleasantly smooth, almost like a novel.

-I’m looking forward to seeing Piper awake this weekend.

I’m actually not really sure that these count as art. So, the title may be a little misleading. I have been doing a lot of work on the side, with my whole web development hobby and it reminded me of when I used to spend hours in the old Abobe Flash program making nerdy little cartoons. I would generally try to update the homepage of bootysmak.com every couple of months with one of these. Here are a couple of goodies that I still have saved. There is actually a couple of them still on the server. All of the links are on this page.

Reag, Piper called and wanted me to tell you she says happy birthday. Oh yeah, and one more thing: I want to say Happy Birthday!

The other day, one of my friends accused me of not liking hip-hop. I was completely stunned, at first. The more that I thought about it, the more it made sense. Because, honestly, I haven’t really been a fan of a lot of the stuff that has come out recently, claiming to be hip-hop. I mean T-pain and the whole voice modulation thing have just about killed the genre, for the time being, in my opinion. But that doesn’t mean I’m not into hip-hop. I totally get down with the organic stuff, especially. I’m talking like, Souls of Mischief, Jurassic 5, Roots, Esoteric, 7L, and such. I even get into a lot of the mainstream stuff. The first time I ever heard in “In the (da) club” it changed my life. Although, I can’t really vouch for 50′s recent stuff. The song that I’m sharing today is a fun mix of an old Jay-Z staple, “Ain’t no ****a.” The reason I can share this one is because they used the radio edit acapella for the mix (which is the clean version). So, give it a listen and enjoy!

The bad: I just finished doing our taxes, and because Reagan doesn’t have withholdings, we have a massive IRS payment to make by April 15th. Yuck.

The good: I received an email from Coke today, telling me that the “10 code per day” limit, at mycokerewards.com will no longer be in effect after Feb. 16. Woo hoo, that means that I can finally get rid of all of the lids that have been piling up on my desk and around the house.

Yamaha released the specs of the 2009 YZR-M1 (Valentino Rossi’s bike) this week. It is all of the usual crap: >200 hp, >320 kmph, Ohlins, Marchesini, Brembo, etc., etc.. But the part worth noting, was not in the spec sheet. Rossi gave a Q and A, which was also released this week. Rossi spoke briefly about the testing he has been able to do on the new M1, stating, “I had the chance to try the 2009 prototype briefly after Valencia but more so in Jerez, when I was very fast. The bike seems better and I was faster than I was with the 2008 version.” Fast enough to hang with the Italian bikes on the straight? I guess we will find out, in April. One more part of the interview that I thought was great, is that Vale enjoys snowboarding. Of course he does. I swear, we should be homies.

In unrelated, yet equally good news, Beastie boys are releasing a 20th anniversary edition of the Paul’s Boutique album. I woke up with the following note in my inbox:

Celebrating the 20th anniversary of Paul’s Boutique we have digitally re-mastered and reissued the record. The reissue comes in five versions offering everything from a digital-only package with 320kbps MP3 downloads to an exclusive limited-edition V.I.P. Type package that includes a CD, 180-gram vinyl, a Paul’s Boutique t-shirt and a never seen before poster that’s 8 ft wide. (OH WHAT!?????!!!!!!???) Most items are available exclusively at beastieboys.com

Digital downloads are available in lossless formats (FLAC and Apple lossless). You’ll also find band commentaries, videos, original album art, and more.

Drop by http://paulsboutique.beastieboys.com for more info.

Sincerely,
Paul

Isn’t it great that they let Paul break the news? Hahahahaha. I’m totally on this thing, man. Finally, I can get a copy of “car thief” that is the same volume as the rest of the songs on the playlist.

This may seem like a dumb question, but where did the pink ginger go? I’m referring, of course to the Gari, that the delivery guy always brings with the sushi. I swear, it always used to be pink. Starting about 6 or 8 months ago, it has been an off-white color. At first, I thought it was just an anomaly. But after several months, I figured that something must be up. I’m not making this observation based on one sushi place, either. I’m talking about various sushi joints, from the north end of the island, all of the way down to Battery Park. Was the pink ginger supplier outbid by the white ginger supplier? Is there only one pickled ginger supplier for the whole island? Has a recent study found that pink ginger is a carcinogen (like the red M&Ms from the 50′s)? I have wasted about 20 minutes researching the answer to this questions now, without success. Does anyone know?