Smooth Soul Groove Monday

I’m really feeling mellow today.  In a good way.

I don’t want to get stressed out this week.  I don’t want to let things get to me.

I won’t.  They can’t.  They won’t.

I think I’m going to find and play good music everyday… and share it with you.

First up, here’s something from Anthony David. Its a duet with India.Arie.

From Anthony’s album “Red Clay Chronicles”, here’s their collaboration: Words.

They definitely make beautiful music together.

I believe that
Heaven must be like this
Ray of sunshine
Kissed upon your skin
Just say you love me
Make my day go good
Pot of gold at the
End of the rainbow

Can’t tell you nothin’ you ain’t already heard
No matter what I say it’s nothin’ but words
Just let me prove to you what I know is real
Let me express to you the way that I feel

I believe that
Love is synonymous
With heaven
Such a sensual bliss
The way you touch me
Makes this life so good
A reward at the
End of the long road

Can’t tell you nothin’ you ain’t already heard
No matter what I say it’s nothin’ but words
Just let me prove to you what I know is real
Let me express to you the way that I feel

Fairy tales can be
Real if you just believe
Go my mind made
I don’t plan to leave
Cuz you were meant for me
Simple that may be
Why be complex
Loving you is so easy

Can’t tell you nothin’ you ain’t already heard
No matter what I say it’s nothin’ but words
Just let me prove to you what I know is real
Let me express to you the way that I feel

 

The Art of Distraction

Watch and enjoy these two distracting clips from YouTube!

(The clips seem to run a bit slow; YouTube issue, perhaps? Let it buffer.)

How to Pretend to Give a S#1t About the US Election:

[The Onion via YouTube]

MBA-101: How to Distract Your Employees:

[via Video Sift]

If you look closely, you’ll see Simon Pegg (‘Shaun of the Dead’, ‘Hot Fuzz’, ‘Run, Fat Boy, Run’) in the office skit.  Its from the British comedy sketch show “Big Train”, which ran on BBC2 in 1998 & 2002.  He not only performed, but he also helped write material for the show as well.

Have a Good One, folks!

Peace and Much Love.

We Believe

The Urban Prep Creed

http://www.urbanprep.org/

We believe.
We are the young men of Urban Prep.
We are college bound.
We are exceptional — not because we say it, but because we work hard at it.
We will not falter in the face of any obstacle placed before us.
We are dedicated, committed and focused.
We never succumb to mediocrity, uncertainty or fear.
We never fail because we never give up.
We make no excuses.
We choose to live honestly, nonviolently and honorably.
We respect ourselves and, in doing so, respect all people.
We have a future for which we are accountable.
We have a responsibility to our families, community and world.
We are our brothers’ keepers.
We believe in ourselves.
We believe in each other.
We believe in Urban Prep.
WE BELIEVE

See the story here: http://preview.tinyurl.com/5zvnxf

Read the story here: http://preview.tinyurl.com/6odv99

An excerpt:

“CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) — The odds were never good for 16-year-old D’Angelo Gardner. His father died of a heroin overdose when he was 9 years old, and by the eighth grade, he was caught up in a gang.

“I had a real bad attitude towards … everybody. I didn’t wanna talk, I didn’t wanna do work,” D’Angelo recalls. “It was just hard, and I didn’t wanna be there.”

Growing up in Englewood, one of the city’s toughest neighborhoods, the statistics for young black men are grim. Only one in 40 African-American males in Chicago will finish college, and 50 percent will drop out of high school. If that weren’t bad enough, guns and gang violence are almost a part of daily life. This year, nearly 30 Chicago Public School students have been shot to death.

But in the center of this impoverished neighborhood, there is hope.

The Urban Prep Charter Academy for Young Men, founded in 2002, has become a haven. The charter school, which is not part of the Chicago Public Schools system, has a mission to prepare young black men for college and promote self-esteem and success.”

I think this story offers real hope; not just for them, but for all of us.

And I think their experiences could be used to help others with similar issues in their educational systems, plot a positive way through.

Peace and Much Love.

(Thanks to Ian and Paula for sharing this story with me.)

GOAL!!!

I reached a milestone today.

My blog has been hit over 1000 times!

In a little over a month, my fledgling effort has crossed the 1000 mark!

Woo Hoo!

To celebrate my little ripple in the blogosphere, check this video out. Its a video made by Rémi Gaillard, a French man who scores “goals” using the urban landscape as a soccer field!

[NQTV via Metmeticians]

Some interesting stats about some of my blog’s visitors:

• The majority of you came from the US:

• The blog has been read from the East to the West. Brunei is in the hizzy!

Most of the Trinidad visits shown above are probably mine. This particular site tracker thingy can’t ignore the visits I make to the blog when I write stuff, hence the discrepancy.

• I get visits from the US State Department (state.gov; 3%) too.

I seriously don’t know whether I should be happy or scared.

• My most read/popular posts:

…We Are The Ones…

Of Monkeys and Men

Painting the White House Black

Most of these posts have one thing in common: Barack Obama.

Well, in the time its taken me to put this post together, the march to the next 1000 has begun.

Thanks for reading, thanks for visiting, thanks for sharing.

Peace and Much Love.

The Evolution of the Game Console

I love video games. They’re an outlet that challenges and entertains me at the same time.

Here’s something I got from the GeekSugar blog. Its a slide show showing the evolution of gaming consoles from the ’70’s to now. Peace.and.Much.Love.jw.

I always remember my first experience… playing ‘Pole Position’ on my friends’ Atari 2600 consoles. Many, many hours were spent in front of the television and at video arcades during vacation breaks!

Video goodness in post. I’ve never even heard of some of these machines!

more about “The Evolution of Game Consoles“, posted with vodpod

Firefox 3 Being Released Tomorrow!

Firefox, the world’s best browser, is releasing the latest version of its browser tomorrow.

Firefox 3 promises to be even more user-friendly, even more secure, and even more customisable than Firefox 2!

To celebrate the launch, they’re trying to set the Guinness World Record for “the most software downloaded in 24hrs” by organising a “Firefox 3 Download Day”, which is tomorrow, June 17th.

So far, over 1 million people have pledged to download the browser all over the world.

Go to http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord to take a look at the number of people who’ve pledged worldwide thus far, and for more information.

Right now, Trinidad and Tobago has 618 pledgers signed up to download the software. Jamaica has 628.

Both numbers are rising fast!

PLEDGE NOW!!!

UPDATE!!!!!!

Download Day starts at 10.00AM PDT (US Pacific Time Zone)

That’s 1.00PM EST, AST or GMT-4

Take note!

Of Monkeys and Men

…with apologies to John Steinbeck.

( Taken from Rob Rogers @ the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette )

In March, a Marietta, Georgia bar owner sold jerseys that tried to associate Obama with the cartoon character, Curious George.

There were protests against the shirt… people were upset at the racism inherent with calling someone of African descent a chimpanzee.

Yet, all of them sold out.

Now, another company is selling monkey-related, Obama-associated items.

Ready to see Obama portrayed as a monkey in a suit?

Then check out the The SockObama doll.

All of them are sold out, too.

Some have said… isn’t Obama a political figure, like George W. Bush?

And don’t we have lots of caricatures of Bush as a chimp? How then is this Obama-monkey thing, racist?

Well, has anyone ever associated people of Bush’s race with monkeys, apes or other simians?

No. That seems to be reserved for people of African descent apparently…

Historically, blacks have historically always been “branded” ape like. European culture back in the day considered Africans to be savages and like monkeys. Its one of the reasons Africans were enslaved in the first place. We weren’t considered human at all.

Now, I’m not trying to incite hate here. I’m just pointing something out…

The company that’s selling the dolls seems upset that people are calling their doll “racist”!

( Taken from Shakesville )

Myth? Fable? Fairy tales? Folklore?

A charming association with a toy we had when we were little?

Huh?

Its almost as if… its so ingrained… they don’t see how racist that doll actually is.

Anyway, let’s see what Dave Chappelle had to say…

Hmmm. Tell me something…

…Is Obama not a man and a brother?

If anyone could think that of a Harvard educated lawyer, State and United State Senator and Presidential Candidate…

What could they be thinking about me?

I found out about all this on June 11th 2008.

Lets take a look back in History to another June 11th… this time in 1963.

(image taken from CBS)

On that day, Alabama Gov. George Wallace stood at the door of Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama in a symbolic attempt to block two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from enrolling at the school.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose?

We still have a long way to go.

Obama won the Alabama Democratic Primary, though. There’s still hope!

References used/Related items:

• http://www.post-gazette.com/robrogers/Default.asp?m=6&d=6&y=2008
• http://www.plunderbund.com/2008/06/11/racist-obama-doll/
• http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2008/06/the_makers_of_a_racist_obama_t.html
• http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2008/06/creators-of-thesockobama-of-course-we.html
• http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/abolition/black_imagery_gallery.shtml
• http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part2/2h67.html
• http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1294680
• http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/06/11/national/main558016.shtml

Peace and Much Love.