Thursday, June 30, 2011

THIS IS WHAT'S UP, JULY 2011

I haven't been posting specifically to this spot for a while, though I hope everyone can see the new Tweets when they pop up to the right ... I've been posting more thoughts at portlandashtangayoga.com.

However, I just finished a swell Yoga asana practice next to my wife (Don't worry! The child was in the other room huffing glue or something) and now we're gearing up for a Moon Day Barbecue.

I just got Van Halen Van Halen. I lived overseas a lot as a kid, and my exposure to certain aspects of American culture was arbitrary and based around whatever year I happened to be State-side.

So it is with delighted surprise that I have discovered that this album shreds off your fucking face. Plus David Lee Roth is a total fox. Though what's up with Van Halen II? Meh.


As far as pop culture goes, I'm leaning into Dio-era Sabbath and I can't stop playing this State of Mind drum 'n' bass album. Drum 'n' bass? There're interviews with both Samuel Delaney and William Gibson in the new Paris Review. Grant Morrisson's Supergod is out next week-ish. Green Lantern remains my all-time favorite superhero though I was decidedly nonplussed with the movie. There're new The-Dream and Rapture singles that are fucking insane, pure face-melters. The Rapture song is a Chicago piano house line, a saxophone, some handclaps, and oh yeah, the lead singer's paint-peeling caterwaul.

I've got more posts percolating on Ashtanga Yoga and vegetarianism, Ashtanga Yoga and Crossfit, as well as a review of the various ginger beers I have been downing lately.

I'll be sharing some info from one of my fave philosophers, Slavoj Zizek, who has some interesting insights into Vaidika versus Tantra approaches to purity, as well as what that implies for vegetarianism; he also quotes another quite interesting personality, Wendy Doniger, too.

I've received a bunch of questions lately regarding Ashtanga Yoga and nutrition. It's been interesting and fun to share my experiences and resources in that regard. I spent a bit of time under a barbell, on still rings, under a pull-up bar, on a rower, or barfing out my spine on a 400-meter sprint, so what the hell, if you've got questions regarding Crossfit and Ashtanga Yoga, or Crossfit and Yoga in general, or even Yoga and "exercise" or "working out" in general, fire 'em my way.

All these interests continue to feed and serve my practice of and interest in Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga — that's right, even my interest in Ronald James Dio.

So...the Mysore program has exploded this summer; I'm changing up the afternoon practice tip — it's just too hard; I've got a July Vegas trip in the works; we're gonna scrape it together to get to Mysore in fall.

What else? As Vonnegut said, "So it goes" and I'm off to fire up the barbecue and crack a ginger beer.