Panmankey

Unknown to most people is that I have a 15 year old girl side. ?I was unaware of this for much of my life until I started listening to Avril Lavigne. ?Don't worry I never bought into that "Avril is a punk" garbage, to me it's just bubblegum in its purest form. ?Bubblegum-pop is much like actual bubblegum. ?It's intensely satisfying for all of about ten minutes, and then all the flavor is gone, but then after that initial disappointment we have another piece, and the cycle repeats its self. ?Stuff like Kelly Clarkson and Avril is like that. ?It's fun to listen to for about twenty minutes, but it's ultimately disposable. ?No one is going to sit around twenty years from now and fret over the deep meaning of "So Much For My Happy Ending." ?

This only came to me today because I've been listening to a bubblegum group called Hey Monday after seeing one of their videos on Fuse (Fuse is like Mtv, but they actually play videos, it's amazing what I'll watch while eating lunch). ?While liking the video (entitled Homecoming), I watched it with a sense of shame since I could hear my brother whispering over my shoulder "you are not a 15 year old girl." ?We like what we like I suppose, and in this day and age it's a rare treat for me to find anything "new" that I like, even if it's only for 20 minutes.

Winter came to Michigan on Sunday, highs under 40 degrees, and light snow. ?It wasn't enough to amount to accumulation, but it was enough to elicit a groan out of me. ?Just thursday it was 70 degrees up here (who said global warming was a bad thing?), and then boom, winter. ?I think the gods were just smiling after the Obama victory on Tuesday and decided to extend a little bit of summer to the soon to be frozen Midwest.

Right now I'm hard at work on a new workshop about Satan. ?I've been working on it for months, but got distracted by the election. ?I'm concerned about how it's going to received since it starts out with a lot of Bible stuff. ?I have nothing against Bible stuff, but I'm not sure how my audience (you I hope!) will react to it. ?It's not a funny topic, and I sort of enjoy telling jokes. ?At least the pictures are good.

I need to thank my friend Kenny Klein for the shoutout in Modern Witch Magazine. ?It was a short mention, but a mention in some rather august company:

To read the whole article, go to: ?http://www.modernwitchmagazine.com/otr/otr_b2008.htm

I guess I do make the rounds, and hopefully somebody is excited to me when I show up at a festival.

Stay warm!

-jason