Two Good Legs

That wasn't so bad.  It was a creepy but not so painful process.  I was concerned the other day when my surgeon told me that my ACL looked funky in the MRI and he wouldn't know for sure until he got in there.  Well, today on the phone he told me that he "really wailed" on my knee and it seemed tight.  I cringe at the thought of him wailing on my poor knee while I am out, cold.  I told him to try it while I am awake and see what happens.

He also said that he found a piece of ligament floating around in there and he couldn't figure out from where it came.  Did it drip down from my old shoulder? Was it planted there by someone? I remember digging through full bags of garbage looking for a tiny, missing  piece of 18th Century veneer that disappeared from a chair I was working on.  I would like to think that my surgeon would take similar measures.  I don't know what to think about that.  I think I just won't think about that.

They don't say anything on the label about mixing Vicodin and high test, single bean selection, gravity  flow,  Criollo chocolate but they should.  I feel funny.  This is when I start doing regrettable blog posts.  Who reads this drivel anyway?

driv·el

   [driv-uhl]  Show IPA noun, verb,-eled, -el·ing or(especially British) -elled, -el·ling.

–noun

1.

saliva flowing from the mouth, or mucus from the nose; slaver.

2.

childish, silly, or meaningless talk or thinking; nonsense; twaddle.

A Good Leg

I had an MRI yesterday and an operation today!  My meniscus was breached, its integrity compromised, some mechanical breakdown occurred but now, hopefully it is fixed.  It took about half an hour.  

I had my kids mark up my good knee so the blub blubs in the OR didn't operate on the wrong knee.  It worked.

The couch part of my rehab will be all about chocolate research.

Charleyland, OR

I live in a fantasy world. Here is the proof. This is my house today. How could I justify a bad mood?

The MOGmobile is back. It has been on a 4500 mile tour and is ready for an interior makeover. Lounge is the word I have been given. I will keep you posted.

Wine Update

My goal is to put Merlot back on the map. I know, that is a bold statement coming from a guy who drools at pop tarts but the movie Sideways wrecked Merlot for a lot of people and I'm not going to stand by and let this unwarranted alienation of a perfectly good varietal continue, uncontested. I'm going to do something about it. Especially after tasting a '98 Petrus Pomerol last Fall. I really just dripped a drop out of an empty bottle onto my palm and licked it. It tasted like hand with notes of things I had been doing and I will never forget it.

The Nectar Vats

Here is the Merlot I am making with my pal Joe and a highly qualified peanut gallery of real winemakers. It is working while I sleep. Every day in the barrel it is getting a rounder, fuller mouthfeel and a buttery cherry flavor as it muscles through malolactic fermentation, allegedly. I need to stick some toasty oak in the barrels because the ones I used are neutral (aka: old and cheap, like... super cheap). I actually just stripped the barrels off the soapbox car and epoxied the holes. The addition of some good oak will make the wine a little more dynamic. It will taste like it was aged in a nice barrel. Fake the oak.

This is the results of a chromatography test. I like the way it looks.

My plan is to ask a few of my ultra talented pals to design labels for the wine in return for some of the wine. Maybe I will send them a bottle and they can drink it, name it and make a label for it. That way I will feel like I have a bunch of different wines in my cellar because they will all have different labels. But really it will just be a giant stock of minky Merlot that I can give away, bring around and barter with. Black market fun tickets. Tax That!

These are the Merlot grapes that will set things straight.

Chocoloflop

Sometimes having a bad temper can produce some nice results. At least, that was the case today when my beautiful wife and I attempted to temper 2 kilos of chocolate. Although our efforts yielded undesirable returns as far as well tempered chocolate goes, the medium has grabbed us both by the short hairs.

Woofing down chocolate has been a passion of ours for-almost-ever, so we decided to take the plunge and learn more about it. Chocolate is like firefighters, you just can't say anything bad about em.

Below are some pictures from the day. Don't be fooled. We totally flopped. Ironically, when we figure out how to do it right, the pictures will probably become more boring. Hopefully there will be a long drawn out learning curve.

medical supplies

I am nursing a wounded knee. Something is not working very well down there. So much so that I had to locate a rental pair of crutches. Luckily Portland has a great place to rent medical equipment. Shamrock Medical supplies has everything you need. Either of those look like they would be pretty helpful.

NEXT!!

I spent the weekend down in Austin, Textus for the MOG party at the sxsw music festival/interactive conference. It was an unveiling of the MOGmobie and it seemed as though it was a hit. If nothing else, it is a smile generator.

I had a great time. The Black Keys, Broken Bells and my favorite, Demolished Thoughts featuring Thurston Moore (Sonic Youth), J Mascis (Dinosaur Jr.), and Andrew WK. I was rocking my homemade leather pants, my Chuckie T Experiments and a clean function shirt. I felt like a hundred bucks.

The function shirt attracts a weird demographic. I was getting the "sup, we-have-high-visibility-stripes-in-common" head nod from the traffic and construction guys. One citizen thought I worked for the city. I was eating one of the tastiest pulled pork sandwiches when the guy came up to me and said,"Excuse me, sir? There is a dead dog in the river over there. Could you take care of it, or call someone?"

I said, "Now you tell me, right after I dropped four bucks on this sandwich!" indicating that I could and would have been happy with a free dogmeat sandwich, had he informed me 5 minutes earlier.

But enough about the past.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words but a decent picture costs a thousand bucks. That is a dollar per word. Maybe I should consider a career in wordography. How many words are in an average epic? I'll call it The Baths I've Taken. That would get me in the lettuce.

let·tuce

   [let-is] Show IPA

–noun

1.

a cultivated plant, Lactuca sativa, occurring in many varieties and having succulent leaves used for salads.

2.

any species of Lactuca.

3.

Slang. U.S. dollar bills; greenbacks. fun tickets.

This is a tentacle of the multipus growing in my head as I try to figure out how to make the MOGmobile project a juicy worm that will attract more pleasure. I mean, work. Where do I go from a big blue hairy monstermobile? Maybe I'll do a boat with Dorrito sails or figure out a way to attach mini ad banners to mosquitos. Let's make a phone for the clumsy and the fatfingered!

As much as I love furniture, it is the design process that really curls my toes and I am hoping to use the MOGmobile project as a way to broaden my appeal. This weekend my friend suggested following his sister's lead and sell anti-fungal cream to podiatrists. I have to take that as proof that my appeal has already broadened and I am looking forward to a future more vast than bright.

vast

   [vast, vahst] Show IPA adjective,-er, -est, noun

–adjective

1.

bloated with opportunity, oozing good fortune; dripping fortuity, etc: the future looks vast.

2.

of very great size or proportions; huge; enormous: vast piles of rubble left in the wake of the war.

3.

very great in number, quantity, amount, etc.: vast sums of money.

4.

very great in degree, intensity, etc.: an artisan of vast skill.

Can you tell I read a David Sedaris book on the plane? I would be honored if you could.

Out of the gates

Pre-departure trip to Richmond School. Driving my kids to school in the MOGmobile might have been the best part of the whole project.

Is it inappropriate to crank up the MOGmobile and start a dance party on RT 101 while we wait for a crash to be cleaned up?

All that remains here in Portland are the fiber shards in my underpants. I have come to enjoy the titillating effects of the glassy hair shirt and will miss the ganky smell of uncured resin in my sneakers. It has been a whirlwind of a month. The cardinal sin for a designer like me is to let a cool project out the door without a great photo. I am guilty of that sin, but that is what you get when you squeeze a 4 month project into 5 weeks. So you will just have to trust me when I say that the MOGmobile is amazing! Glowing eyes, articulating arms, rockin' stereo, smooth ride, hairy and hell a friendly. A little smurf, a little Grimace, a little Seuss, and a lot of blub blub blood.

The drive down to San Fran was a mess. It rained like crazy for the entire trip. Nothing like busting your butt on a project and having to deliver it, looking like a soggy muddy blue poodle. The good thing is that the MOGmobile functions very well in weather, so I don't have to worry about that.

Thanks to David Hyman and MOG for the opportunity to do this crazy project, and thanks to everyone for helping me out.

Now what? Anyone need their living room painted? I can clean out behind your fridge, I can do yard work, drywall, build a deck? What you want? I am available

magical drilling

Like snowflakes on a sunny day, we are all glistening in a magical sparkle cloud of fiberglass dust. It is truly beautiful. I dance in the heavenly mist.

MOGress Report: All Praise The Blub Blubs!!

I am literally fighting back tears at the overwhelming outpour of effort and time people have put towards the MOGmobile. Remember when Tom Sawyer had to white wash the fence? Well this is that to eleven. People I don't even know are proudly donning the Blub Blub blacks and plugging holes just to be part of this insane project. Today we had 12 people working like ants and we got quite a bit accomplished. Unbelievable. Thank you.

The stereo rocks! This vehicle will cause mayhem anywhere it goes.

Bloodflow

9:30-9:32 is exercise time at Kapow Design. Then, back to work. Put your respirator on and join us on the web cam, your day will be more productive.

Hair phases are always tricky. Every hairy monster mobile I do seems to offer new challenges. In the name of R+D I bolted a fuzzy sample to the hood of my designmobile. I am happy to say that the hair has maintained its luxurious integrity through the last three weeks of Portland's wet winter.

The plugging process is tedious but offers a quantifiable satisfaction. This a hectic project and settling in to a plug session is a relief. Dip and plug, dip and plug, Ahhh sweet dip and plug. It is quiet, steady and blue.
All adjectives aside, here is how it really happens.

Team drilling

Team plugging

Team fluffing

MOGmobile Udate

The Team is kicking some fuzzy blue arse. We have enlisted a group of highly trained Blub Blubs to assist in the hairplug process. They are in the black Blub Blub shirts.

PreBlue

Blue

Blue too

Blub Blub

Blue hair here

Samples And an Update....Two Bits.

Here are some peripheralisms from the MOGmobile.

The foreground is the MOGmobile, the background is another project that is sharing the room with us. The manager of the Watershed Building is putting a lift kit on his burner rig.

These are some samples testing for color, density, DNA

Don't Ask.

First ball attempt using a balloon failed when some rascal with a pea shooter popped it.

Birth of the ball with a yoga ball inside.

Here is how the MOGmobile looks tonight.

10,000 Years Of Fiberglass Experience

It is a fortunate occurrence when you have the opportunity to do what you do best. Kapow Design boasts a cumulative ten thousand years of fiberglass experience!

We have everything under control.

Techcrunch.com!!

Thanks to the folks over at TechCrunch.com for spotlighting the mogression of the MOGmobile! Much appreciated. Just for the record, beyond the technology we are integrating as far as gear goes, we should mention the fabulous efforts of the unrecognized freaky scientists who came up with the polymers and the ketone configurations that make this monster possible! If you see a piece of plastic or some polyester resin today, stop and give it a lil kiss.

I guess I better hurry up and finish this beast.

Things You Don't Want Your Client To See

I'm going out on a limb here because that is where I feel most comfortable. Here is a link that will let you see live action MOGmobile fabrication, thanks to Dead Letter, the manager of the Watershed building. There will be action between the hours of 8 and 8 every day, give or take a few hours on both sides. If you see anyone in a Function Shirt slacking off, please send me an email and I will have them replaced.

The MOGmobile is progressing with deadline fervor. I am picking polyester resin out of my hing hong as I type. My hope is to post frequently but my fear is that the MOG brass will panic at the sight of an out of context process image. Sometimes are not the best times for a client to see a work in progress. Back at Carlton House Restoration, Kenny had a process by which he would actually light a table surface on fire with some alcohol to bring out some orange hue from the wood grain. Not the ideal time for the client to stop in for a look. The MOGmobile is in a similar state right now. Hopefully not on fire, but you never know with that resin. Mix it a little too hot and we will have more orange hue than we know what to do with!

We are basically building out the van with foam which we will fiberglass over. Then we will give the bald bambino 24,000 beautiful blue hair plugs, add a psycko sound system and send her down south.

Below are some images of the mogression.

We actually used whipped cream to form the fenders.

Here is the van with the plug- pre glass

This is the scene here. It is like a work hurricane.

Taking form.