This Just In...

Intro Podcast

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 23:34:00 +0000

This is just to see if I´ve set this all up correctly to podcast. Not sure why I´m doing this, if I never even blog...what makes me think I´m all of a sudden going to start "podcasting"? stupidity probably. But I bought a recorder today, and am excited to give it a try.

https://dl-web.dropbox.com/get/test2%202.mp3?w=f3ea632a

A Passionate Title

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:10:00 +0000

Living in another country is interesting. I try to keep an open mind, and understand that some things I might find strange here are really just "different"...and usually these differences are a big part of what makes it interesting to live here in Mexico. But...sometimes there are differences that you just have to laugh at, and not in a "that´s strange", chuckle-contemplative kind of way...no. You have to laugh in a hilarious, mocking "that´s absurd" kind of way. One of these things I´ve had many a good laugh at are the translated names of American movies. Granted, translation can be a tricky endeavor...many of the clever phrases we use for titles just don´t exist in other languages. But, even after accounting for that difficulty I´ve found the following titles to be to ridiculous and hilarious:

It goes like this. Original Title - Spanish Title: English Translation of Spanish Title. My comments.

1. Rainman - Cuando los Hermanos Se Encuentren: When Brothers Find Each Other.
Two brothers hanging out, catching up, remembering old times.

2. The Notebook - Diario de una Pasión: Diary of a Passion.
This one captures the latin-lover sentiment, while showing the tendency to change titles that would have made perfect sense if translated literally. El Cuaderno...perfectly fine.

3. Thelma and Luise - Un Final Inesperado: An Unexpected Ending
This might be my favorite. You might be thinking "How will this movie end?" I´ll tell you, in the title...unexpectedly.

4. The Sound of Music - Una Novica Rebelde: A Rebelious Nun
This is awesome. They took a masterpiece of musical movie-making and made it sound like a low-budget tele-novela, the one that comes on after Ugly Betty.

5. Jaws - Tiburón: Shark
Obviously

6. The Departed - Los Infiltrados: The Infiltrated
I guess this one isn´t so ridiculous, but it surely misses the point of everyone in the movie dying (except Mark-the-body-Walberg). Post-spoiler alert! If you haven´t seen it already, there´s nothing I can do for you now anyways.

7. The Shawshank Redemption – Sueños de Fuga: Dreams of Escape
Exchanging redemption for escape in this title just cheapens it. I wish I could tell you that Andy fought the good fight, and the Sisters let him be. I wish I could tell you that...it´s good thing he had his dreams of escape to pull him through.

8. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind – ¡Olvídate de mí!: Forget about Me!
(I believe in Mexico it´s The Eternal Resplendence of a Mind without Memories)
They tried with the Mexican version...but in Spain, come on! Forget About Me! makes it sound like a romantic comedy where someone gets bonked on the head and amnesia induced hi-jinks ensue. (ps. 50 First Dates, which should be titled Forget About Me!, is called As If It Were the First Time)

9. Groundhog day – Atrapado en el tiempo: Trapped in Time
Sounds like some Orwellian sci-fi thriller...Quantum Leap the movie...gone terribly wrong!

10. Scarface - El Precio del Poder: The Price of Power
Yeah, it´s a heafty-effing-fee.

Also, as a funny sidenote, Kermit the Frog is named Rana René (Renee the Frog) and Barny Rubble is called Pedro Marmol (Peter Marble)....so weird.

Here´s a few of my proposed Spanish titles.

Harry Potter - Travesuras del Joven Mago: The Young Wizard´s Mischief

Lord of the Rings - El Chaparro que Destruye el Anillo: The Short Guy that Destroys the Ring

New Moon - Una Pasión Supernatural: A Supernatural Passion

Back in Mexico

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 00:46:00 +0000

Of the countless ways to analogize the chronology of life's passing (book chapters, sands of time, play acts, etc) some of you may remember that I prefer the movie analogy to these other, more archaic comparisons. A movie has a soundtrack, action, scene changes, comic relief, drama, attractive people, and--unless its a bad indy film--a happy ending.

Well, another scene in Joey's movie has begun. The scene set in Fort Collins Colorado-where I was a graduate student-segues into this new scene when a week or so before graduating, I sent an email to the contacts at the Universidad Autonoma de Yucatan, who I was working with this summer suggesting that they should hire me back on as a professor of the same Intro to Sustainable Enterprise class that we improvised this summer. To my surprise, a few weeks ago, I got a response saying that we should go for it and why don't we start working out the details...classes start February 3rd! So, now I find myself in Merida, Mexico for another 6 month stint. You know times are tough when graduate students have to emigrate to Mexico to find work, but I guess that's what it's come to...it's not surprising given my past tendencies for taking off and ending up in Mexico.

From February to July, I'm going to be teaching one section of Intro to Sustainable Enterprise (it's a new class, so new, even I don't know what it's really about!) at the UADY Business School. My class will be undergraduate students, in their 3rd or 4th year. I'm excited to be here, work hard, have fun and learn a lot...as I always do in my time spent outside the US, and my comfort zone (speaking of comfort zones, I'm crashing at my buddy Harry's house, where I'm sleeping in his guest hammock). This scene has promise, stay tuned, keep your fingers crossed that the peso doesn't continue devaluing, and that this scene introduces the señorita of romantic interest.

Create your Fame and Go Back to Sleep

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 20:13:00 +0000

One thing I like about Mexicans is their usage of sayings (folk wisdom if you will). In Mexico they´re called Dichos, and it´s not uncommon for people to say them in everyday settings. During my summer practicum in Mérida, I picked up a few more, and in the process realized that these sayings remind me a lot of the sayings my grandpa used to use. It seemed like he had some Western/Cowboy Witicism for just about every setting and situation. Here´s a shortlist of some of my favorites from Mexico and some of my Grandpa´s doozies.

Niño que no llora, no mama - Baby that doesn´t cry, doesn´t nurse. Mexican equivalent to ¨squeaky wheel gets the grease¨.

Arbol que nace torcido, jamas su tronco se endereza - Tree that springs up crooked, never straightens its trunk. This is like saying that someone who´s proven to be a bad egg from the get-go will always be a bad egg.

Plantado como novia de rancho - Stood up like a small-town fiance.

Como perro de rancho despues de la boda - Like a ranch dog after a wedding. This is for when you´ve eaten way too much food...ranch dogs are supposedly skinny, and at the wedding they binge.

Crea Fama y Echate a Dormir - Create your fame and go back to sleep. This one refers to the fact that once your reputation for a certain type of activity is set...it doesn´t matter what you do (you could just go back to sleep), people will continue to believe the image you initially created.

Vestido Quemado, Vestido Comprado - I actually made this one up, and it means ¨Burnt Dress is a Bought Dress¨...I actually burnt a dress, and had to buy it...but in a less literal sense, the saying could refer to having to own up to your actions. (ie. if you knock up your girlfriend...vestido quemado, vestido comprado).

Here´s some of my favorites from my Grandpa´s list. Some of these are pretty strange, and I have no idea where they came from...but it was always funny to hear my Grandpa in his thick Texan accent say them, and for some reason they seemed to make sense and fit the situation:

On Food and Eating

After one of Mom’s meals – “There’s something good about everything, but there’s everything good about that”.

About Injuries

“Why, if I was a hog and had that on my nose, I’d go ahead and root.”

On Children and Youth

To a youth (usually a boy) – “How old are you? How did you get so ugly in so few a years?”

About his grandsons – They were either “little farts, shit-eaters or roundheads”

On Animals:

Horsess – “He run like a striped-assed ape”.
“That horse was wound up as tight as an Elgin watch”.
“That horse was so poor he wouldn’t make glue”.

About People:

Someone inept – “He couldn’t piss out of a boot with the directions on the heel”.
“He couldn’t hit a bull in the ass with a bass fiddle”.

A reckless driver – “Take it away Leon, born in hell and homesick”.

A slow driver – “That guy’s got no place to go and all day to get there”.

This one really cracked me up: “She’s so crossed-eyed she’d have to lay down to look down a well”.

“She’s so skinny she’d have to stand in the same place twice to cast a shadow”.

“You need two of them hats, one to shit in and the other to cover it up with”.

“He was nervous as a whore in church”.

“If I had a mechanics job and another job, I’d take the other one”.

Someone cheap – “That guy was so tight he squeaked like a new saddle”.

Person with a hangover – “he was so hung-over, his eyes looked like two eggs in a slop bucket”.

“A woman can love a monkey as well as a man.”

On Nature & the Weather:

Good grazing grass – “The grass was stirrup deep”.

Rain – “It was a turd-floater between San Ysidro and Bernalillo”.
“It was raining so hard the ducks came inside”.
¨It´s a Toad-strangler¨

Cold – “Cold as a well-digger’s ass”.
¨Colder than a witches tit in a brass bra¨

Water – “The man that made that sure knew what he was doing”.

Cold Water - “As cold as a whore’s heart”.

Snow - “The snow was ass-deep to a tall Indian”.
“It was snowing so hard you could poke a hole in it”.
“The snow was so wet you could fill a gallon bucket and when it melted it’d run over”.

A hot, sweaty day – “Sweating like a nigger at ‘lection time”.

About the Man-made World:

Trucks, etc. – “I wish I had that “truck” and he had a better one”.

Money – “I wish I had the money to buy that truck (a new Kenworth)”. Daddy @ 75 years
“What would you do with a truck like that”? Calvin
“I didn’t say I wanted the truck I said I wished I had the money for a truck like that”.

“I wouldn’t buy that if I had your money”

Witticisms:

“If you get there first, make a mark. If I get there first I’ll mark it out”.
“If it wasn’t for work, I wouldn’t have anything to do”.
“It was slicker than snot on a doorknob”.
“If I was any better I couldn’t stand it. If I was any worse, you couldn’t stand it”.
“Give a man luck and shit’ll do for brains”.

I´ve been considering taking a more active approach to incorporating these sayings into my everyday speech, but you can really only get away with most of them if you´re an old cowboy with a Texas drawl.

Farewell FireCamp

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 01:03:00 +0000

A close friend of a close friend came to Mérida to visit for about a week...it was great to have Nicole around, and we had some great Mexican adventures together...crazy extreme spelunking and two run-ins with the Mérida police force without having to pay a single bribe. This campfire (fondly called a FireCamp in honor of our friend Harry) on the beach was a last hoorah farewell for Nicole. It´s just a hug in pelotas Nicole. Click the link to see the whole set of photos.

Early Morning Basketball

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 18:42:00 +0000

Sporadically over this summer, I´ve been waking up to go exercise at the Salvador Alvarado Stadium. It´s a big, open-air stadium that´s open to the public, and in the mornings it´s full of Yucatecan people doing tae-bo, jogging, playing tenniss, swimming, and to my suprise...a vivacious early-morning-old-guys pickup basketball league.

My personal history with early-morning-old-guys pickup basketball leagues goes WAY back. I think my dad started waking me up to go play basketball when I was in like 4th grade. In those days, in Eagar, the basketball started at about 5.15. You had to get there early to get on a good team, so in order to get there on time we woke up around 20 till 5, swung by to pick up Nathan Thurber (on several occassions I was sent to sneak into his house...go down to his room in the basement and wake him up). Only now is the insanity of all this occurring to me....sending your 10 year old into someone´s house uninvitedly at 4:40 in the morning??

These epic Stake Center battles were multipurpose; teaching younger guys how to play dirty, exercise for the old guys (side note...I spell the word exercise wrong about 97% of the time), reliving glory days, for the love of the game, and paying homage to the sport that saved your life in my Dad´s case. Something I´ve learned by playing here in México is that early-morning-old-guys pickup basketball leagues are the same wherever you go. The old guys think they own the court, and can get away with whatever they see fit. They´re always trying to rig the teams to their liking (Don´t deny it Dad, you would purposely miss his free throws to be on the same team as Leon Slade). They play dirty...¨hey, nobody´s counting fouls, right?¨ The old guys will also try to get points without actually making baskets...¨weren´t we 5 already??¨ They´ll also make up rules on the fly, and try to get in your head by cracking old guy jokes. Well, Mexican E.M.O.G.P.B.L.´s are the just the same...only it´s all in Spanish.

All that being said...I LOVE early-morning-old-guys basketball leagues. I actually think the shady behavior of the old guys is kindof endearing....and am looking forward to the time when I´m old enough to be one of those Old Guys.

A Shoutout to My Sources

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 01:55:00 +0000

I probably love music to a fault. I´ve loved music ever since I was a kid, riding around with my dad in the mountains listening to his tapes of KDKB radio with Led Zeppelin, Eagles, BTO, (yes, in order to listen to classic rock on his car stereo my Dad had to tape the music when he was in the big city).

This is a shortlist of the people who I owe big-time for introducing me to artists, genres, beats, hooks, lyrics, melodies, rhythms, etc. It´s actually a little long, but I´m writing it for myself as much as any of you three readers.

My Sources.

My Dad and his buddy Leon: These guys used to be like the non-bearded ZZ Top of still-touring-70´s-rock-bands concert attendance...prolific and classic concert goers. I remember a trip to Sedona, squished in a bench seat of Leon´s truck with Jeremy, listening to a Led Zeppelin Remasters tape into the sleepy hours. I have these two to thank for my burning testimony of all Classic Rock.

Sister Melony: Mel showed me the beauty in Gay Euro-pop by forcing me to listen to hours of Depeche Mode. I think Catching up with Depeche Mode was one of the first CD´s I ever bought (it was in my first big order from BMG...remember, you got like 11 in the first order??...man, bittorrent was inevitable). Years later, I cursed her when I became addicted to the song Enjoy the Silence for 2 months...that was the only song I could listen to, seriously.

KQAZ: We only had a couple radio stations in Eagar, and this one actually had a guy that did the worlds worst impersonation of John Wayne as a station identification. I thank KQAZ for my knowledge of every top ten country hit from ´89 to ´95. Spencer, what´s your excuse? If it´s on a ¨classic¨ country radio station, there´s a good chance that I´ll know the lyrics.

Mom: My mom´s strict enforcement of the Sunday-is-for-boring-classical-music rule helped me grow to love George Winston´s December album and other operatic overtures. I like some Opera, there, I said it...man cannot live from indy-alt-country-rock alone.

Devon: Devon was there when I got invited to the U2-athon at Bret Shield´s house. We watched Zooropa, and I was hooked. He kept me on a pretty good diet of U2 and REM for the next couple years. We listened to Dead Presidents of blah blah, Bush, some Green Day, etc. Devol was with me when I watched Pink Floyd The Wall...and those shared emotional scars will always bind us together. (Addendum for Devon, he also showed me They Might be Giants, and Dinner Bell might still be the most sticky song I´ve ever heard).

J-low Wilson: Jared was from cholo-land-border-town, and I´ll always be indebted to him for my appreciation of hip-hop type music...which all started with his Warren G Regulate CD. ¨It´s kinda easy when you listen to the G´d up sound¨

Stanley: Stanley loves to tell the story of how I flinched when he first said hi to me...but the first thing I remember about meeting him was connecting over music. Pink Floyd to be exact. The list of artists I´m indebted to him for is long and includes heavy hitters like Ray Lamontagne, Jeff Buckley, M. Craft, Doves, and any random Techno that I might have hidden away in my iPod.

Tom: Tom plays one CD in his car FOREVER...and for the whole semester when we were the only two back from our missions, it was Lauren Hill. And I love that album now. I also had a couple mix CD´s labeled Mellow like Tom and Tom´s Mellow Goodness...which had some good songs by Huffamoose, Martin Sexton and Mazzy Starr. I guess they were from Jill.

Spencer: Spencer started me down the path of mass piracy. Before I left for DC, he suggested some artists, I made some playlists and burned a few mp3 cds. I ended up with a lot of the music that I´ve been listening to ever since...Josh Ritter, Bob Schneider, Ryan Adams, Wilco, and I think I even got my Rage Against the Machine from him then. It would sound super gay if Breckan hadn´t been third-wheeling, but I remember the drive up the canyon when I first heard Josh Ritter very vividly.

Jeff: I have Jeff to thank for Pearl Jam and Radiohead...two bands that I somehow didn´t realize were THE BEST TWO BANDS...according to Jeff anyways. Jeff would be proud to know that the ¨greatest hits¨ disks he made me for these two bands have flowered into discographies. I love these two bands.

Robert: I know few people with such a thirst for media (and I´m talking complete albums only). Robert and I set up a piracy shop that would have made any chinatown $4 DVD salesman envious. The list of artists for which I am indebted to Robert is longer than the list of dudes who´s lives he´s ruined...and that´s long. Magnet, The National, CYHSY, Andrew Bird, and on and on.

Kristen: Kristin is a DJ for ASU´s radio station. I think we connected more over music than anyone else I´ve known. Any ¨indy¨ appreciation I have came from her. But also my Jenny Lewis, Gillian Welch and Neko Case are from Kristen.

Deke: Deke recently Pando´d me Lupe Fiasco...which has changed my life.

Angie: Band of Horses equals Awesome.

There´s too much crappy music for us all to sift through on our own...we need sources we can trust. I count on you people, so keep em coming.

The Coolest Baby, What?!

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 19:02:00 +0000

Between the end of the semester and leaving for Mexico, I had a chance to hang with the family for a while and get to know this guy. My nephew Remington is the coolest baby there is right now (I can't say ever, because I too was once a baby). I will say that he has the coolest baby name ever. Remington has some great nic-name possibilities...Remi being the most obvious, G-Ton being my favorite. I've also come to the conclusion that Gun Names are cool. It's an undebatable fact that if I have twins, their names will be Smith and Wesson, even if it's a boy-girl split...I think Smith is a cute name for a girl. If I have twin girls, then we'll just have to think of good nic-names for Avtomat and Kalishnakov. (Future Wife, you've been forewarned).

It's great to see my sister Melony and Scott taking care of their baby. They like to sing him nonsense songs that they make up in the moment...but Uncle Joey was on a huge Lupe Fiasco kick when he visited, so I adapted some underground hip hop and sang it to him. I think he liked it a lot..."the coolest baby, what!, the coolest baby, what?!".
I wonder how true it is that babies are like sponges for the first couple years, and that they really form their whole lives from those "formative" years. If that's true, I'm going to keep up with the adapted hip-hop...how cool would it be to have the next great-white rapper be my nephew. G-Ton, represent brotha.

Mexican Wal Mart Devoid of Americans - Ironic Situation Lost

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:38:00 +0000

Merida, Mexico. June 10th. Joseph Darnell and Su Casa project partner John McKinney entered a Wal Mart in Mexico and found it devoid of Americans except for themselves. The potential for an incredibly ironic situation was shamefully wasted. Darnell stated that "we were really hoping for the Wal Mart to be full of Americans because that would have been quite ironic. Instead, it's full of Mexicans...just like any other Wal Mart." McKinney confirmed, "There's nothing ironic about a Wal Mart full of Mexicans. We were hoping for some irony, but nope...just Mexicans".

The two are going to try their luck next week by doing their grocery shopping at Sams Club, and checking for American Day laborers around the corner from the Mexican Home Depot.

Catch Up

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 01:23:00 +0000

Just a quick list of factual statements about my life, to catch readers up so that new blog posts will make more sense.

1. I go to graduate school in Colorado (Fort Collins) www.csugsse.org
2. It's a Masters in Science in Business Administration in Global Social Sustainable Enterprise.
3. I'm in Merida, Mexico for the summer...doing a practicum for my degree.
4. I'm on an Enterprise Team called Su Casa which seeks to develop sustainable housing solutions to global housing issues. We're doing market research and product development for a home which would be suitable for the low-income housing sector here in Merida...affordable, green, aspirational. www.sucasaproject.com
4. I'll graduate in December.

Man, that was a short list. Of course there's a lot more that has gone on, and is going on...but not the kind of things I'd include in a "quick list of factual statements"...they're more likely to end up on my "long list of amazing stories and very complicated life stuff".

more blog posts to come.

"Self-Rightous, Autistic Roomate Leaves Behind Sweet Bike"

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 23:16:00 +0000

Fort Collins Colorado. This 30 year old Schwinn Supersport bicycle was left behind for Joseph Darnell to "take to the dump or something" by his former roommate. This bike-abandoning roommate is simply known as El Nido (spanish for The Nest) by his friends. The nickname came as a result of his very nest-like living conditions within his 10' x 13' bedroom. El Nido was known for his unsurpassed ability to make even the most trivial conversation a painfully awkward experience. His passion for biking all over Fort Collins Colorado was salient, even in a town know for biking enthusiasts.

When asked to comment on El Nido, Angela Robson stated "his two main attributes were his self-righteousness and his autism." Joseph Darnell also mentioned El Nido's enviable delusions of grandeur, and his knowledge of Walker Texas Ranger factoids. Visitor and close friend Jared Stanley pointed out the bizarre Nido habit of reacting apathetically when asked his opinion of anything. Stanley graciously offered to allow El Nido to play his World of Warcraft character...after three hours of playing the game for losers and geeks, El Nido's reaction was "eah...it's ok" when asked his opinion.

El Nido left Ft. Collins in a cloud of mystery. His father came on a warm Northern Colorado spring day, right when biking conditions were hitting their prime, and packed the nest into a U-haul. Except for the schwin bike, no other traces of El Nido have been found. Darnell's life has been greatly improved on many fronts as a result of the mysterious disappearance and bike-leaving. "I'm gonna miss that blank stare and the weird self-righteous comments that made everything so awkward, fortunately riding that bike will help me put his memory behind me".

Sporadic Blogger Gets Great New Idea

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Thu, 29 May 2008 23:16:00 +0000

Colorado man Joseph Darnell has come upon a new idea to increase his blog-post frequency. Darnell, possibly one of the worlds most sporadic and unreliable bloggers is mounting a herculean effort to change his blog-post style all together. Leaving behind the conventional 1st person "update on my life" style of yesteryear, Darnell is embracing the hard-edged, sensationalist and downright dishonest reporting style that has made newspapers so damn readable for years.

Darnell denies any claims that his inspiration for increased blogging activity comes from any outside sources. "The onion is either fake news about real news, or it's fake news about made up news. My blog is fake news about my personal life...which isn't really news at all". Apparently, he was struck by the irony of his blog title, considering the time delays between his posts. New circumstances, and requests for updates from people he never knew looked at his blog, have inspired him to take up the cause of the weary and lazy blogger.

Asked whether he intends to do every post in the new, faux-news format Darnell commented "no way, it would get annoying for the three people who read my blog, and it would be too much work to write in third person...like I'm reporting on my own life all the time, it's kinda wierd". Darnell went on to state that the blogs will occasionally be in the new format, but reserves the right to write in whichever style he deems right as the writer.

Mr. Darnell said the new format seems to be working already, this post being his main source of evidence for that claim. He also said to be on the lookout for some of the following blog posts:

"Self-Righteous, Autistic Roommate leaves Sweet Bike Behind"

"Two Dogs, Many Lies and a Summer Sausage - Havasupai 08"

"Mexico: Su Casa es Mi Casa"

"Normal LDS Single has Unexplainable Ability to Attract Worlds Wierdest Roomates"

Darnell also reserves the right to make up headlines that he never actually writes blog posts for...just to keep people coming back for more.

Some pics from the Summer

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 01:49:00 +0000

This photo links to a flickr set of some photos I took on my drive through southeast utah and NE AZ when I came up to Colorado.

This one links to some photos I took over the summer of the White Mountains in AZ...my homeland.

This is to some photos of canyoneering in Zion this summer. So cool.

More photos of Colorado to come soon.

it's been a while...

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 06:30:00 +0000

I feel as Madonna did...like a blurgin, blogged for the very first time. Only I think it was way more significant for her to feel "like a virgin" than it is for me to feel wierd blogging again; just based on sheer frequency of her deeds vs. my past blogging forays.

Enough about that though, it's good to be back. And I'll take this chance to also give a heads up that Marc's blog o' dreams is also B-A-AH-CK!...and there's some doozies on there. so check it out. www.blogodreams.blogspot.com

Part of the reason for the long hiatus in the blogging activity is that catch 22 situation where it's been a while, so you feel overwhelmed at trying to "catch up" le blog, and you put it off....only to find that more and more events to catch up on keep piling up. Well, when I really look back at big events since my last blog, there's not THAT MUCH.

Basically, I got into this MSBA program at CSU. the Global Social Sustainable Enterprise program...yeah, it's a mouthful. And sometimes, I like to act as pretentiously as possible and say the whole damn thing. it goes something like this. unsuspecting person: "so what are you studying" Joey: "it's this new masters program at the School of Business" u.p.: "oh really, what's it called?" Joey in his mind to himself: - "well, I tried to give you an easy way out but you had to pry...I don't know you that well, and I doubt we'll become great friends, but you insist on asking me all these questions about who I am and everything about me, why can't we just crack some jokes about what's going on around us, break the ice a little so this doesn't feel like an interview? maybe then later get into each other's personal lives... anyways, here goes, you asked for it..." out loud: "it's a Masters in Science in Business Administration in Global Social and Sustainable Enterprise". u.p. somewhat dumbfounded by incredble sounding name full of buzzwords: "whoa, sounds fancy".

Damn right, it IS fancy. Anyways, I'm glad I'm here...learning a lot, and trying to open some doors for myself. Love Colorado thus far, and am predicting that how much I continue to love it through the winter will correlate pretty closely with my ability to buy lift passes.

Done for tonight. More to come...but don't want this special blurgin feeling to leave...what to do?

oh yeah, in other news...Wells Fargo bought this pickup, and they're letting me drive it and pay them back for it a "little" bit every month.

Grand Canyon South Siiiiiiiide

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Sat, 17 Feb 2007 01:23:00 +0000

frigid at Grand Canyon
Originally uploaded by Joey Cone.

A while back we had planned a weekend of adventure in Southern Utah with Spencer and Breckan. We were going to do some cold weather camping and explore Escalante canyon-country....a-la-Abbey. Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans...Breckan's coworkers were idiots (I think she's suing...not for being idiots though) and they couldn't come. Lacey and I ended up camping outside a town called Jerome...an old mining town, turned avant guard artist community. The next night we camped south of the Grand Canyon on the Kaibab National Forest. Bummed we couldn't meet up with breck and spence, but the weekend was a success nonetheless. Jerome was cool, Lacey looked cute even without two days of showering, and we had, hands down, the best hot chocolate ever made over a campfire.....wait, I'm gonna just say this, it was the best hot chocolate ever made, period. The trick is to put a chunk of peanut butter fudge in the bottom of the cup...and being very cold also makes it tastier.

adventure-fort-swingset-thingee

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 01:29:00 +0000

adventure-fort-swingset-thingee
Originally uploaded by Joey Cone.

This is what I've been doing for the past two weeks. When I built the first kiddie corner log cabin in the doctors office, a guy that saw it asked me if I could build him something in his back yard. We sat down and designed something like this...it was smaller and not so complicated. Two weeks later, this behemoth adventureland fortress was finished. We've already got orders for a couple more...maybe I'll be a carpenter now, I mean if I have to pattern my life after someone, why not Jesus, right?

Prove me Wrong

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Sun, 17 Sep 2006 19:22:00 +0000

"Hours before the Pope spoke, two churches in the West Bank were attacked with firebombs in what was believed to be a reaction to the Bavaria speech.

In the Somali capital Mogadishu, an Italian nun was shot dead by gunmen. The shooting may have been connected to strong criticism of the speech by a radical Somali cleric." - BBC News

Does anyone else see the incredibly twisted irony of this situation? The Pope says that Islam was founded on inhuman and evil principles, in reference to the prophet's directive that islam be spread by the sword. Violence in the name of religion. So how do the offended muslim masses react??? By shooting nuns and firebombing churches. It's like calling the schoolyard bully out on being a jerk, only to have him beat you up or threaten you in order to prove that he's not a bully. The logic is pretty hard to counter.

I think the Pope's "retraction" should have included something that basically challanges the nation of Islam to prove him wrong. Please, prove him wrong. I think the whole world is tired of walking on pins and needles because they're afraid of the volatile bully who will bust your lip if you look at him wrong.

Moments

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Wed, 16 Aug 2006 01:22:00 +0000

My buddy Spencer is full of ideas...occasionally they're pretty good. Before I left on my trip to South America, he had one of those good ideas. His idea was to create a compilation travel journal. Said journal would be passed from one backpacker to another, and each would write a story, confession, or something interesting. When the journal had traveled the world, the last writer would send it back to Spencer's mom's house (because spencer has no official residence). This is what I wrote:

I've held onto this journal way too long now. Knowing that it's going to eventually find it's way back to my buddy Spencer has added a little extra pressure, and I've been waiting for something awesome to write. Well, I've been traveling South America for about 3 months now, and seemingly my whole trip has been awesome.

Working my 9 to 5 at a DC law firm (sometimes more like 9 to 9), inspired me to travel. I got tired of the routine life, and bought a 1 way ticket to Lima. As I left DC, I got the sensation that I was going through a succession of "lasts". Last Metro ride, Last day at the office, Last time at 806 9th St NE. The exciting thing was that it was a segweigh into a succession of "onlys". Only time flying 1 way to Lima, only time on a crazy bus to Cuzco, only time pirhana fishing in the Amazon. I realized that, for me, that is what traveling is all about: Moments. A wise man once said "moments are the molecules that make up eternity". Creating unique, memorable moments was what I wanted. That's why I left the routine haze that had become my life; the life where one day blends into the next, and before you know it a year has passed and the few moments you remember are on weekends you got away.

I've had innumerable "moments" on my trip. There's one that I remember which made me think "all the world is right":

It was the 5th day of a week-long river adventure I'd undertaken to arrive at Iquitos Peru from the border of Ecuador on the Napo River. I was traveling with a british girl and an ecuadorian. We'd contracted a guy named Pepe to take us down river in his small "peque-peque" (the onomatopoeia which refers to the sound of the two boat's cycle outboard engine). Pepe knew a family at a riverside village called Monte Verde where we could eat lunch. As we pulled up, 2 young boys catapulted off a ledge about 8 feet above the water. Wearing only their gigantic smiles, they looked like the carefree image of childhood happiness...framed between the brown Napo River and the blue Amazon sky. I think they were the only family at that extrememly isolated settlement. A mother of 6 kids -- all running about half naked, shoeless, happy -- set about cooking a chicken Pepe had killed on the spot.

The heat was stifling, and I convinced the two boys to give me a tour of their private swimming hole. There's really nothing I like more than a swimming hole with a good cliff or rope swing. Nothing. Something about jumping through the air into the water makes me feel like a kid again. There, in the middle of absolutely nowhere on the Napo River, flipping, splashing, running and jumping with these two boys, I was happy. That was a great moment.

Pics

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Tue, 15 Aug 2006 22:51:00 +0000

Lately, I've been looking through the pictures of my trip A LOT...it makes me happy, and I get that wanderlust feeling again. I loaded onto flickr my favorite photos from the 10 rolls of film I took on my trip. Check em out. CLICK HERE

Top 5 Things about the Overnight

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Fri, 04 Aug 2006 11:33:00 +0000

Lately I've been helping my sister out at her group home because she's short staffed for the long summer days...and occasionally I get to help out with the night shift. The night shift is sweet for any number of reasons besides the shear challange of keeping one's self awake through the wee morning hours (anyone can last until 3, when a second wind kicks in...but it's the 5:30 to 7 stretch that'll get you if you're not on your guard). These are some of those reasons:

1. Cheaters. This show is awesome...I don't know how it's not on during primetime. A tall, generally creapy guy named Nick Greko has a team of sleuths that get secret footage and data on the suspected cheater. When the cheating is undeniably confirmed, they take the cheated spouse/party to confront the cheater; not in some neutral location-no studio with jeering audience, but IN THE ACT of cheating. That way they catch the person the cheater has sucked into the mess, and much drama ensues. At www.cheaters.com it states that "This program is both dedicated to the faithful and presented to the false-hearted to encourage their renewal of temperance and virtue." Yeah, like the virtue of making money by exposing someones infidelities on national TV. Nice Nick, real nice. Great TV though, in a very gritty, hard hitting reality COPS kindof way...no catchy reggea theme song, but still good.

2. Seeing breaking news about the arrest of serial shooter suspects at 3:30, before anybody else even knew.

3. The commercial of the lunatic in the question mark suit that's selling the book full of secrets to getting all kinds of government grants. You know the guy. How did this guy become convinced that the dual colored suit and the manic screaming about handouts was a good marketing strategy? Besides, if he has all the secrets to attaining super-slushy funds with no strings, what the hell is he doing making insane commercials trying to sell a book? Definitely something wrong with that scenario.

4. Listening to one of the boys sleep-talk and walk. He covers everything from renegade beatles in his room, to someone needing paper urgently. Mostly, I enjoy this because it brings back nostalgic memories of when I shared a room with Tom, and I had a 7 a.m. class. Tom would sit straight up in bed and talk to me about how his grandpa used to camp along the provo river back when there were a lot of bushes along it. It was nonsense, but he spoke so loudly and clearly that it usually took me a few minutes to realize that he was still asleep. And it wasn't isolated. It happened all the time. I won't mention some of the more perverse and lude things that his mind has seen fit to ponder in his sleep, but I'm sure they'll come out in the comments...right fag machine??

5. Taking a 5 a.m. dip in the pool to pull me through the next few hours.

Flame Broiled Steak

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Mon, 30 Jan 2006 07:55:00 +0000

Based on the following evidence, I'm nominating Spencer, Myself and some Mike guy for warren's (www.hummblog.blogspot.com) Manly Man/Men of the Week Award.

On the first truly cold and blustery day of winter, our friend Keyworth invited herself over with a bunch of other people to cook dinner...which is ok, because she brought the food. What's not ok was her lackadaisical approach to the manly ritual vulgarly known as the barbecue. Unable to take proper preparatory measures, we found ourselves with a BBQ full of mud and leaves and a bag with a measly mound of weathered briquettes. These briquettes had been exposed to the elements since our barbecues of early fall...and it's safe to say they had soaked up a gallon or two of water. Stars burn out and become black holes, death and taxes catch up to you, and water-soaked charcoal briquettes loose all guise of "self lighting".

If testosterone were flammable, we could have easily just breathed fire onto the tired briquettes, but as it was, we resorted to something equally as manly. Improvisation. I found a couple cans of OFF, and after the Fresh Scent can caught fire and nearly exploded in my hand, we used up the Deep Woods. No Dice. But not to be defeated, we began to intermingle twigs and newspaper in with the briquettes...but still to no avail. All the while, the girls (and this one skinny guy that went to an Indigo Girls concert) were in the kitchen nay-saying. "Guys, we can just fry them in the pan"...please, why don't you just cut off our testicles and throw them in the pan as well. Finally we decided to build a damn fire under the briquettes and light them up whether or not they wanted to burn. This Video is evidence.

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We didn't kill any dear with our hands, but we did perservere in the face of great odds, and managed to maintain the integrity of one of the last sanctuaries of manliness...one of the few places that feminism has yet to taint...the barbecue.

Leap Second

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Thu, 19 Jan 2006 21:27:00 +0000

"Scientists are delaying the start of the New Year by adding the first "leap second" in seven years"...awesome. If I had known about this leap second, I might have had something to look forward to on my grueling trip to Times Square.

Apparently, the friction of the tides causes the earth's rotation to speed up/slow down, and additional seconds have to be added every so often to even things out and keep scientists software and hardware from becoming obsolete. Nice...an extra second of life, graciously given by geniuses in lab coats huddled around "the UTC atomic clock" in Switzerland. I suppose over the course of a lifetime, one might have unknowingly accrued an additional 10 seconds or so of life that he/she didn't even know about...and probably just wasted it watching Dick Clark or Ryan Seacrest. read more from the DMC...

I think this is just one more push toward the 10 hour day system. But until then, one thing's for sure, I'm not wasting my next leap second. Not sure what exciting thing I'll do to take advantage of this sweet extra second of life....Any ideas on something awesome to do in 1 second?

New York New Years

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Tue, 10 Jan 2006 05:56:00 +0000

It looks like such a party. Ryan Seacrest is on some stage with some crappy bands, people in the background are screaming and having the time of their lives...or at least the time their year. Bad news, this whole Times Square New Years party is a hoax....as big as the one that convinced millions of people that men actually walked on the moon. Maybe bigger, because year after year hundreds of thousands of people continue converge on Time Square, while the whole moon-walk thing seems to have faded into history. Don't get me wrong, maybe for the 1000 people within eyeshot of Ryan Seacrest it is a party(pants party)...but for the other 749,000 people who were hearded like bipedal bovine, 5 feet at a time, for 8 hours in the cold, to watch a red ball drop....it's not so much fun, and a little anticlimactic. After the countdown and red-ball-falling, I kept waiting for the throng to join together in a stirring rendition of Old Lang Syne, but it didn't happen.

I'm not really one of those guys that does things just to be able to say I did them...but in this case, I can't really see any other justification for having done it. What really gets my goat is all the people that keep saying "you did what?...of course Times Square sucks man!" But nobody bothered telling us it was a bad idea BEFORE we decided to get on a 3 a.m. Chinatown bus, with nowhere to go in New York to get sleep other than a public library and the movies. Spencer, Iuri and I ended up going like 50 something hours with no real sleep...since they kicked us out of the library and we chose the loudest movie EVER to try to sleep through.
Anyways, it was a fun trip in the sense that it's over and we survived. I always love New York.
this is a little video I put together of the trip footage and photos.
Enjoy

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Darnell Family Getaway

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Mon, 09 Jan 2006 06:34:00 +0000

The Darnell Family headed for the hills this fall to do some camping and elk bugling. This is a little video I put together. There's not much elk bugling in the video, but it was fun to make.
I'd never even thought of this activity as especially redneck or "backwoods" until some of the responses I got from my friends in DC. I just assumed that everybody grew up listening to the seasonal mating calls of the fauna in their surrounding area. Well, don't knock it until you've tried it. There's no sound quite as cool as two big bull elk in the rut, bugling and fighting for the choice cows.

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10s

noreply@blogger.com (Joseph Cone Darnell) — Mon, 05 Dec 2005 18:40:00 +0000

10s seem to be the natural order of things. The girl-rating system of 1 to 10, along with the metric system (aside from the US' ridiculous late adaptation) are two of the most unifying and simplifying mathematical institutions of this or any Century.

I was painstaikingly converting 15 minute increments into .25s on my timesheet when it hit me....The 10 hour day! How much easier so many things would be if we weren't always having to multiply by 60, 24, 7 or 12? Who thought of this system??...and it isn't really that great as it is, because every four years we end up with this random extra day. It's lame....and I'm guessing that on Kolob, they've already shifted to the D-10 system...and that "paradasiacal glory" really just means no confusing a.m. or p.m. I know, it blows your mind to think about whether you'd put 2.4 of our hours in every hour, or just change the actuall length of the second, minute, etc....and all the implications.