Puppy Without Front Legs Gets Help from Model Airplane Wheels

After a rough day at the office, this warmed my chilled heart right up.

Meet Hope: the Maltese puppy who was born without two front legs. Such a sweet story.

Shopping for a Cause

If you love Rosa Loves, you’ll also love Elsewares. The independent art and design site is similar to Etsy, but donates a portion of their funds to a non-profit organization, which is picked by those who purchase goods from the site.

In their words:

At checkout, every ELSEWARES customer can select from a list of nonprofit organizations we choose to support. Each customer’s selection is logged as a vote, and at the end of each quarter we divide a portion of our profits among these groups, according to the number of votes each received. It’s that simple.

I picked up this little bauble and voted for the Natural Resources Defense Fund. Go shop and give back!

Someone Great

I won’t get into how loss is all around us or any of that that sad stuff. But if you haven’t seen any of Tim Russert’s memorial service which was held at the nearby Kennedy Center today, do watch some clips. Lots of great speeches from great orators about a great American.

Many of them invoked Daniel Patrick Moynihan during the service, including one of my favorite quotes:

“I don’t think there’s any point in being Irish if you don’t know that the world is going to break your heart eventually.” (1963)

And don’t forget to watch the surprise performance from The Boss.

[Jam of the Day]: LCD Soundsystem, Someone Great

I Love Rosa Loves

I know Valentine’s Day isn’t until tomorrow, but I’m going to be busy packing for New York (yay!) and I’ve really wanted to share with you this important love-related item.

As I’ve previously noted (on this blog, Creative Victuals, and in conversations with you), I’m not huge on Valentine’s Day, alias, the glorified Hallmark holiday. I don’t enjoy the staples of Valentine’s Day; it’s the small, unique gifts that (to me) show how much you care about another person. This is exactly the kind of V-Day mantra D and I have taken, which I hope sticks with us for years to come.

This year I was stoked to find something for D that was not only cool, but that also made a difference in the world.

Enter: Rosa Loves.

Rosa Loves is a talented group of designers who have infiltrated the t-shirt business as a way to impact in-need individuals and families around the world.

But these aren’t your standard t-shirts.

Each shirt is designed for a certain family or project. When you buy a particular shirt, a large percentage of the proceeds go to the person of family for which it was designed. Rosa Loves personalizes the t-shirts even further by printing each respective story on the inside of the shirt—right over your heart.

Rosa Loves has tailored charitable giving in such a way that you know who you’ve helped—and gives a new meaning to wearing your heart on your sleeve.

I can’t wait for me and D’s t-shirts to arrive (no…we didn’t get matching shirts, and he doesn’t know which one I got him, so I can’t show you yet.). I can tell you for sure that this won’t be my last purchase from Rosa Loves. I so love them. How appropriate.

[Jam of the Day]: Mew, Comforting Sounds

Don’t tase me-slash-serenade me, bro!

It’s a taser. It’s an mp3 player. It’s a taser mp3 player—and my perfect solution for warding off hoodlums.

I distinctly remember having a conversation with a group of friends two summers ago, when I was single and needed some protection. Sure, there’s your standard mace, but let’s be honest—mace isn’t exactly user-friendly at the time of an attack. First you have to locate it in your bag because the keychain portion has invariably fallen off. Then you have to take off the lid or switch off the safety latch. Then you have to point it in the general direction of your attacker and manage to spray a thin stream right in his eyes before he stuffs you in your own trunk (which hopefully has a glow-in-the-dark internal release latch). Not very intuitive.

So I remember saying to my friends two summers ago, “What about a knife?” And one of my friends who had been through cop training said that knives are the weapon most easily turned around on the owner. Not wanting to be knifed or have my kidneys harvested in my own dimly-lit parking ramp, I had to pass on the knife.

It was about this time that my friends got out a small, unloaded gun from their gun safe and placed it in my hand. Now, I’m not really a gun-wielding type. They freak me out and I’m overly paranoid as it is. Not a good combo. And who wants to deal with shooting an innocent sushi delivery man or maintenance attendant for the rest of their lives? Not I.

By the end of the conversation, I had nixed every self-defense option except the moves I learned from watching Miss Congeniality reruns on TBS, and knocking a creep square across the nose with my Nalgene bottle.

But the taser mp3 player has changed everything. Not only can I jam out on the DC metro/elliptical trainer/office workstation, but I can protect myself too. Hell, I didn’t even know it was legal to tase people! Microsoft Word doesn’t even recognize “tase” as a verb! Plus—bonus!—I can use it without actually killing a person (myself included…accidents happen), causing them to go blind, or stabbing them in the palm (I have no formal knife training). Just one little tase wherever I can reach, and boom—down they go and away I run. (Homeboy will get the rest of his punishment in jail. It’s always the sexual deviants that get it the worst.)

You can buy your taser mp3 player here for just $349. In the meantime, get a jump on your playlist with these electrifying suggestions from Metro UK.

[hat tip]

Know Where You Are

Tonight D shared with me one of his favorite motivational morsels—Jim Valvano’s acceptance speech for the Arthur Ascher Courage Award at the 1993 ESPYs.

Like D said, most inspirational speeches today err on the side of cheesy and rarely continue to reverberate throughout our lives. But D saw this speech in junior high and continues to reflect on it as he makes life decisions. (He also happens to have most of it memorized.)

Although it can never carry as much weight for me as it does for him, I’m glad I finally got to see it. Somehow meeting the right person makes you feel like there’s not enough time. And whatever time you’ve got, well…you want to make it worthwhile.

Valvano died three weeks after giving this speech. It’s amazing to see him so strong and vibrant here, knowing that cancer was literally tearing through his insides. (The clip doesn’t show it, but he had to be helped off stage and into his seat.)

Take a look at the speech and don’t be afraid. It’s not all sad. Valvano was a pretty funny guy.

Have a good Wednesday, y’all. And thanks, babe for sharing this with me.

[Jam of the Day]: Brandi Carlile, The Story

No Angels Came

I’ve been trying to string words together in order to explain how amazing my time in Juarez was, but, as it turns out, I can’t.

I’m not sure there’s any way to describe the extreme poverty and living conditions in which these people exist, nor the lack of police and government protection as more than 400 women have been brutalized and murdered since 1993. [Video from Amnesty International]

It’s hard to describe the feeling of gifting a family with something as simple, yet huge as a home, as well as the unexpected camaraderie and friendship built along side a three-room structure. Best time ever, I’m telling you.

And it’s damn near impossible to describe the grotesque feeling that creeps into your stomach as you cross the border into the U.S. and realize that a third-world country is 12 hours away from your home.

I can’t pinpoint exactly how this experience will affect how I live the rest of my life, only that it already has.

I guess what I’d ask of anyone reading this is to pay attention and help however much you can, in whatever way you can. You might not be able to change a country on your own, but helping to change someone’s life is indeed as great a gift received as it is given.

And now for a few photos from my Juarez Flickr set (and apologies for the odd spacing that won’t fix itself)!

What we started with

Rosana, Brian & Lovine

A personal favorite

The kids’ play area, filled with garbage

Me coming out of the outhouse. Eek!

The sun sets on day one

Scared chicken. Hilarious.

Part of Team Uncomfortable: Making people feel awkward one at a time.

Lots of photos on Flickr. It’s Friday—browse away!

[Jam of the Day]: Tori Amos, Juarez

Adios, amigos!

Oh, what a week.

I’ve mentally drafted five different versions for my letter of resignation for work (you know, one for each workday), given the leasing office notice that I’ll be moving out in 10 weeks, and tomorrow I’m leaving for a three-day housebuilding extravaganza in Juarez, Mexico for two families in need.

I won’t get into my deep-seated fears about Juarez (I spent most of the morning stressing about that); I think it will be a good, yet hard, but rewarding trip, as well as a last hurrah of sorts with some of my best compadres.

So wish me and my dinky ass hammer some luck, dammit! And keep your fingers crossed that I run into some Alpacas. Could they get any cuter?

Monday Pick-Me-Up: Bruce Springsteen with Arcade Fire

My love for Bruce Springsteen isn’t a secret. I **love** him. We’ve even touched on the similarities between The Boss and Arcade Fire on this very blog. So imagine how delighted to see that The Boss played with Arcade Fire at their Ontario gig last night!

Some amazed fans captured some video for those of us unable to attend. WordPress is being a bitch and won’t let me embed said video, but check out Springsteen playing with Arcade Fire on “Keep the Car Running.”

Read more about it on Stereogum…big thanks to Freakgirl for posting this today.

[Previously]:
Arcade Fire Covers New Order
NMT: Arcade Fire and Bruce Springsteen?
Arcade Fire Ruled

Vulnerability is a Necessity

I’ve been thinking lately. Thinking hard, and so tirelessly that insomnia has ceased to exist for four days, and my dreams are once again the cracked out, incoherent craziness that accompanies that foreigner, that non-citizen: REM sleep.

I don’t have much to say about said thoughts; the fact that they exist is enough for now. But the Untitled Love Project turned me on today, which is due in large part (I suspect) to the kinds of conversations I’ve been having with you all lately. The project is in conjunction with ISM, and is, at its most basic, a collective contribution of broken hearts. Each contributor was asked to revisit an old relationship and express it through their medium (sketch, paint, illustration, text, etc.).

The event itself was held this past Saturday in L.A., but you can still view the pieces online. The last time I checked it looked as if they were working on organizing the pieces, but they’re all there and worth looking at. (Some of my favorites: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.)

I haven’t found, nor have I sought, any grand conclusions lately. Perhaps I’d just forgotten that we’re all inherently so very flawed. And perfection is simply an illusion.

[via]

[Jam of the Day]: Metric, The Twist