We gotta start doing more video blogs… we’ll get on this soon…
Another fun show tonight… this time outside of Portland… great crowd… thanks to everyone who came out to the show… I wonder if my new friends I met at the Vietnam memorial out by Washington Park were there… hope you guys are feeling good today…

namaste…

well… life is trippy… isn’t that a crazy understatement? life is soooo trippy…
I was reading a book that james gave me called The Inner Game of Tennis... and it had this passage about how amazing the human body is, how subconsciously interconnected everything is… how right now as you’re reading this, your eyes are differentiating between the color of the letters and the background… comparing them with our memories of other symbols and forming words and cohesive thoughts out of the combination of words… and all the while, our heart is beating constantly and our organs are gathering the essential elements from our food… and on and on and on… it’s just a wonder how everything works…

isn’t it all so wild??? and to think that our bodies grew themselves, and all the hair and skin and bones and everything that keeps growing… how do we know how to DO this?

crazy…
We’re off to Seattle tomorrow… and then on and on…

I just wanted to say hello… and put up a nice video i just saw… here it is…

I was going to put up a post that I found on on http://www.huffingtonpost.com about something to do with the election… but then I decided to just ... not put up anything about the election… Still, that huffington post website is full of good information if you’re interested… and you SHOULD be interested because so much of our deeply interconnected world will be affected by the outcome of this election, and we’d better hope that whoever “wins” is gonna help the most amount of people possible… there is just SO much stuff on the internet… it’s amazing. 

everything is amazing…
all of these beautiful things and all of these tragic things happening side by side everyday…
we all just gotta keep breathing deeply and doing our best…

what a mystery life is…

Hope you’re having a great night… and I hope this Sunday is a day of rest and relaxation for you. 
Love,
jrc

So here we are… how are you? Another day… how did you sleep? enough? feeling rested?
busy? happy? stressed? First of All… thanks to you all for coming out to our shows with the counting crowes and augustana and sara bareilles ... this has been our favorite tour so far… and we’ve really had a great time with y’all so far.  Second of all… Someone responded to the last blog about this upcoming US election with the question “is it really all that simple?” and… i don’t know the answer… part of me says Of course it’s not simple… there are SO many people on this planet, and all of us are leading unique lives with totally different circumstances shaping our worldviews… but then on the other hand, if you look at it from a certain angle, that fact does indeed become simple… because if we realize that not everyone thinks about the world the way that we do, and we give people space to lead their lives according to their beliefs, then hopefully we can figure out a way to set up a structure in society that cares for everyone’s health and basic needs.  Now, i know that there are times when certain peoples worldviews include some kind of insane belief that people with opposing viewpoints from theirs need to be killed… for either economic gain, or in the name of God…

In either case, i hope we can all agree that it’s just not right to go out and kill people… It seems hard to imagine that any divine force out there (an all powerful, all knowing entity that we could call God… or Allah… or Krishna… or Boran… or Shangdi… or Thixo, Gunab, or Tsui… or any other name that humans have given the unfathomable… go look on widipedia for Names of God) would actually want us to kill people who used a different name for IT… I like to think of the different interpretations of this divine force as cultural nicknames… they’re endearing… sometimes people have lots of nicknames… it’s not surprising that God would have lots too. God is very popular. 

I don’t know how to deal with those people who kill for the second reason… I’d like to just say “Look!!! No single person on this planet ACTUALLY knows what God’s will is for us humans… but most people agree that God is interested in us leading basic moral lives… don’t kill others… try not to cause suffering… etc… The golden rule sounds pretty good to me… or as the classic movie Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure so eloquently put it… “Be Excellent to Eachother… and… Party on Dudes!!!!” 

So… to answer your question “is it really all that simple”... I guess i’m gonna go with: NO… it’s not that simple when you try and deal with the whole world… obviously each of us as individuals can’t really change the sweeping scope of this human drama… but we can do our part by trying to peaceful and loving in our own lives… looking deeply into our selves and finding our flaws and working to make them better… respecting each other… finding joy and spreading it… blah blah blah…

I love you guys… I love seeing all the different opinions… and i’m just trying to think about practical things that can be done to make the world a better place… Voting is an important one… especially in this election because things seem pretty chaotic right now.  But to be honest, that’s just the beginning because we all have a responsibility to do our part… I hope we can figure out a way to keep making things better before things get a lot worse…

Here’s a video I wanted everyone to see to just put a simple light on a major problem of the political process, which is that important issues get overshadowed by petty and childish arguments…
check it out:

and also… here’s a link to Joe Biden’s speech from the DNC:

JOE BIDENS DNC SPEECH

Be excellent to eachother…
LOVE,
jrc

Hello From Dallas Texas… another beautiful day… we’re about ready to leave the hotel and go to soundcheck… I’m watching the speeches of Sarah Palin and John McCain… and I just wanted to pass them along to you so you could watch them and see what you think.

I hope you’re having a great day.

Thanks for watching these and taking the time to just look at both sides of this election…

Sarah Palin’s RNC speech

John McCain’s RNC speech

I’m thinking a lot about this election these days because it’s such an important time and i know how much we all want things to just get better.
It’s kind of overwhelming isn’t it? War… Lack of Jobs… Gas prices… Climate Change… Devastating Storms… Pollution… Overflowing Land Fills… Overpopulation… Lack of Food and Drinking Water… Fear of terrorism… Distrust of Politicians… Anger… Racism… Ignorance… Fear…
phew…

I feel like making a list to counteract that one…
Friendship… Love… Family… Hope… Music… Art… Sports… Plumbing… Clothing… The Postal Service (the actual postal service that delivers mail all around the world with an unbelievably high success rate for unbelievably low prices… not the band… but, yeah… now that i think of it… the band too)... Cell Phones… The Internet… Communication… Language!!!... Movies… Eyesight… All the senses… Dreams… Nature… Cities… Recycling… Sustainable Farming… Responsibility… Honor… Nobility… Forgiveness… ETC…

I think we just need to take a deep breath… get informed about what we can do as individuals… and also make the best decision about who to vote for in this next election. What we DON’T need is any kind of divisive or angry or defensive energy… that is my least favorite part of politics… such a distraction from the issues… we need UNITY and UNDERSTANDING and OPEN-MINDED-NESS…

Here’s another blog to bookmark… my friends in New York seek out inspiring things and post them here…

http://www.superforest.org/

I love you guys… happy day.
jrc

hey everyone… happy daytime… or night time… or whatever…
hi.

what a beautiful day it is in los angeles… sunshine… blue skies… etc…

i just wanted to make a post with a link to Barack Obama’s speech from the DNC last week… it was an amazing speech, and I think that everyone in America should watch it regardless of what political party they “belong” to…

I’m looking forward to seeing what John McCain has to say in his upcoming speeches…
honestly, i don’t consider myself a democrat or a republican… honestly I don’t even like to think of myself as an “American”... which is not to say that I don’t love this country… especially the amazing ideas that it was founded on… but I just consider myself a human being who was lucky enough to be born on planet earth on part of this continent known as The United States of America with all of its beautiful and also complicated and also ugly and also noble and wonderful (etc) history… Personally, because I get to travel all around the world, and see how similar people are in different countries, I just wish there was more of a spirit of the United Countries of the World, and not so much divided interests in just our individual countries… but that’s a whole other issue…

getting back to this election… i just want to help elect whichever candidate I believe is going to do the most amount of good for the most amount people, and also put this country back in good standing with the rest of the world… I know we all want that… so let’s just keep watching the speeches, and researching the candidates… it just takes a little time… and then we’ll know… and then we’ll choose…

Please check out Barack’s inspirational speech:

BARACK OBAMA DNC SPEECH

and also… here are some interesting photos from the protests at the Republican National Convention in Minneapolis… did anybody see any news coverage of protests from the RNC? lemme know what where you saw it… and what it was like… thanks…
http://www.motherjones.com/:



PEACE!!!
jrc

greetings and salutations… fellow people of the earth… wow… hello.

i’m in washington DC… it was another great fun show tonight… thanks to those of you who’ve come out to the shows so far… this has truly been the best tour ever… onwards and upwards (until the inevitable decline? NO… it can be upwards always… right?)

OK… so… who likes animals? who wants to help an animal shelter that takes in stray puppies, cleans them up and finds them homes? good… here’s the link to this wonderful place in Los Angeles, and you can make a paypal donation on their site… or maybe someone you know is looking for a fundraiser cause… this could be it!!! save the puppies!!!

thanks a lot… check it out please…

http://www.billfoundation.org/

thanks so much. We love you. Hope you’re having a great night. See you soon?
jrc