MUST EMOTE.

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December 06, 2011

Heres a blog I posted over at Holyclap.com but wanted to share it here too. Plus, since it was about Christmas music, and I was digging through old Christmas songs on my iTunes, I added a couple of songs Meri and I did a long time ago that I still thought were fun. Dont get me wrong, they are terribly recorded and even worse mixed, but hey its all we knew at the time. Ill stick them down at the bottom of this blog:

“We here at Holy Clap! jumped in with the rest of the world and have redone a few Christmas songs. When Dustin and I (Jason) make music not for commercial or client project, we go under the band name Local Lokal. Here are a few songs we have thrown together for different reasons for this Christmas season

Santa Claus Is Back In Town

We played and recorded all the instruments and voclas for this in a matter of hours. Then Dustin mixed it up. Then we sent it off to Greg to put on his famous Chistmas album he puts together. Here is a link to this years Volume. Tons of great indie Christmas music there for you to check out and some, as always, great design work from the infamous Danny Jones.

Oh Holy Night

We recorded this one a little while back. It took more than a couple of hours, thats for sure. If you get bored in the beginning then hang on, It will get to rocking soon enough

Joy To The World (first verse)

Joy To The World

There was a 1+ minute empty spot at the end of a Christmas message that will be aired all over the world on Christmas day via radio and satellite radio . Dustin got the hook up for us to place a small piece of Christmas music at the closing blank air space. Dustin called me and told me to bring a handful of instruments from my studio to the studio he works. We ended up with a reed shaker, tom, banjo, dreadnought guitar and an accordian. This is what we came up with in a few hours.

Hope you enjoy. Feel free to download any and all of the above from my Sound Cloud page.”

Ok here are the couple songs I was going to put up from way back in 2004 that Meri and I did.

Away In A Manger/ A Song For Twins

02 Away in a Manger Nanny-nanny Boo-Boo A Song for Twins

The second half of the song I wrote for my then newly born, or soon to be born, I cant remember, twin nieces Callen and Emerson.

The song was recorded really raw. No edits, just me on guitar and meri singing with no edits… and obviously at the time I had no capabilities on mixing or making vocals sound good. Sorry

Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer

Rudolph the Rednose Raindeer

All of our nieces and nephews on Meri’s side sang along in our then tiny house studio. I remember cramming everyone in as they waited for their part to sing. This will embarrass them probably…. and no you dont hear me singing, that’s Jordan… dont know why everyone thinks its me.

Merry Christmas

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November 17, 2011

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The stories have stopped in my life. This is due to a full time bounty hunter that we hired to enter my life. Amazing for me, terrible for my blog. Im actually down with it. I never asked for all of these intense situations in my life…. except for climbing. I love climbing. Its intense, but its controlled… most of the time. Its outcome is very predictable if you know what you are doing.

Last month an old climbing partner Shane Farmer, who now lives in Chicago, and I went to climb a 1200ft wall called Moonlight Buttress in Zion National Park. For perspective, the Empire State Building in NYC is also right at 1200ft and the new Devon Tower in OKC is a mere 850ft. The highest wall I had climbed prior is THIS ONE at 1000ft. However due to the technicalities of this specific one we had to sleep on the wall for 2 nights, which I had never done and this all made me pretty nervous right up until the climb…..

ok so Im already boring myself. I was going to write a long blog with a lot of photos, stories and technical details, but just watch the video instead and lets all be done with this. By the way, this may be the most boring video of your life. Shane put the video together (not saying thats why its boring) and its basically a few clips of us between pitches. You are kind of so mentally in the climb you dont have a lot of time or energy to take video. I think we successfully got a whole 2 clips of me climbing. How come every trip I go on Im the one with the camera in my hands and never pointed at me? Well shane deserves it as he tackled pitches 4, 5 and 6 in row due to me freaking out at pitch 6 once I realized it was going to require leap frogging a lot of gear giving really huge run out and potential for big time falls. Shane is the man.

Here are some pics I was going to explain and put into detail…. lets just let them do the talking.

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September 17, 2011

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Looking for the link to independent publishing? Go HERE

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August 29, 2011

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The Smith’s (that being me and my fam) were featured on Bringing Design Home’s website today as “Creatives Near You”. Depending on where you are reading my blog from, this may not be a true statement, but if youre from Oklahoma I guess it is. Check it out and follow these peeps on Twitter. @greencdesign

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July 11, 2011

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[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Sunday July 17th. 7pm. Hotdogs and Rock N Roll. Wylder’s Birthday

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June 09, 2011

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It was yet time again for the annual Topless Topless Trip. You can watch the video from the last one HERE. I cant tell you much of why we do these trips. It all springs from a secret society we formed in college named Akka Zoo.

I can tell you it involves an alphabet and a ceremonial crash cymbal. Both of those could probably be accredited to the man gracefully pictured above as he is a typography guru and a drummer. He was not the president though. You can see that man’s humble photo below.

This year it was a pretty normal trip. Well I mean we didnt try to dig up wild things about Oklahoma. We did get stuck in a river, hiked to a farm and had to convince a farmer to pull us out with his $150,000 tractor. We got oddly lucky that he knew who Kyle’s family was. Good to be a farmer in Oklahoma.

So the trip involved camping and exploring the oddly unknown Alabaster Caverns, jeeping the South Canadian river and long boarding every descent sized hill we came upon.

It was a trip to remember. Until next year…. heres a few more shots of the trip. All pics and video shot with old iPhone 3gs

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April 29, 2011

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I think there has been too much house talk on here lately and not enough “crazy situations and bounty hunt” blogs. I dont know what to account that to. Bounty hunts have been slow lately and no one has felt the need to drag me under a car or not take their medications for a month and invite me into their house (which for some reason I always say yes).

Well to continue with house type stuff, Meri and I were featured on Apartment Therapy and a lot of people said a lot of really nice stuff. You can see the link to the feature HERE. Then click their link of “Enter House Tour” to see all the photos.

Meri also did a little home blog of our place before A.T. did and you can view it HERE. She is going to start posting blogs going room by room and explaining all of the DIY projects either on her Smitty Baby blog or the new and coming Be Nice To Your Sister blog, so check back soon for those.

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February 28, 2011

I swear, this will be the last published media I do over the book shelf Ive been building for…. well forever it seems. Along the course, Ive completed 6.8 million other projects. Because of its scope, the book case always took the back burner. Well, I think Im finally finished… well pretty much.

Above is a Stop Motion film of the process. Yeah, surprising…. me and stop motion. I know. The music is from a song Dustin Tate and I recorded last month. More about that later. The building process was thick. Not only had I never built a built in book case, but also never harvested, milled or dried my own lumber. The process of that can be seen in my “How to make a solid walnut longboard” tutorial.

Really the trickiest part of this whole project was getting the 8x6ft sheet of bullet proof glass up my stairs. Words were said, groins were pulled, fingers were smashed. I obtained the glass through a lucky circumstance of our county getting a new county jail. It was the glass from the old Line Up room. You know… where you have guys line up behind a one way mirror and you point to “Who done it”. Crazy enough, no one wanted this $12,000 sheet of glass. Yes, the county still has the receipt on it. So I nabbed this chunk of bullet proof mastery, heaved it into my loft, razor bladed all the one way tint off, flipped it portrait mode and I had the center piece of my book case.

We have eight 7x4ft window streaming across the front of our loft. Light floods in and works itself both ways through the book case from studio to living room. Its a great spot to hang out in our home. I love how the shelves divide the sections by sound, but not by sight keeping the open atmosphere in tact.

The doors on the front of the book case were my first attempt at cabinet making. Cabinet makers earn their keep. They are solid wood surrounds with ply inners. I tried my best to let the sap wood pattern match up as it spun around the edge of the cabinet doors. Though I hand oiled the rest of the book shelf with Antique Danish Oil, I fogged the doors with polyurethane.

Below you can can also see the shoe and crown. I made all of it from 2x6 pine and applied a manuel walnut stain. It was a routa-a-thon during the making of both the doors and trim.

The ladder I made from cheap 2x4 doug fir and painted it. I bought the foot wheels at Ikea in the “As Is” section. I dont officially have it mounted yet. To save some $, I had my pal Wheeler weld up a track out of garage door track. After mounting a piece and questioning the safety, I decided Im gonna hold out and do it up right and eventually buy a real brass bar kit.

The outer Walnut trim, I made out of some really wide walnut lumber that I sliced into strips. I kept everything in order so grain pattern continues into a single picture.

On both sides of the center glass, I used almost identical book matched lumber. It was four pieces from the center of a single walnut tree Kyle and I cut and milled. One book matchedd pair actually belonged to Kyle, but I begged him unmercifully till he gave in. So the final picture is a mirror image of 2 giant book matched lumber sets. I would go as far as to say this is unobtainable except for this one case. It was a huge tree with a limb going right through it, but not destroying the wood consistency beyond use. Anyway, I reallly cant say enough about that, but Ill stop. Plus the pattern formed a butterfly pattern… ok really… im done.

Oh, but wait, theres a whole other side to this animal. The studio side. Yes, its two sided… and I was well spent working on it by the time I got over here.

I was running out of Walnut, and was a way from having another batch ready. I really liked the color of the non brick wall in the studio and wanted to incorporate it into the book case. I decided to apply dry wall instead of wood, and then just trim out the corner of the shelves. It was way more fine wood work than I had planned, but it paid off. The color in these photos are a terrible representation of the actual color. It called “Intense Teal” from Sherwin Williams, and its one of the few colors that are so cool I dont mind painting.

I used raw poplar to make the trim for the bookshelf surrounds. There wasnt a router deep enough, so I used solely the table saw and nearly lost many a digit. It was a long hard annoying process…. as was the application.

Studio to kitchen. A book case keeping a cohesive idea. Im cool with it.

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February 18, 2011

How to keep you child and you from going stir crazy on those single digit weather days. Wylder and I have passed the indoor winter time by skateboarding ruts into our wood floors. All you need is:

-1 bored child

-One chopped long board

-Alcohol to make those ZigZag wheels crazy clean and smooth

-Open floor plan loft

As of this week however, we were glad to move the cruising to the streets. Come on Spring

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February 16, 2011

A Leather Tote Floats My Boat

Luggage, I have an affinity with. A luxury however, it categorizes itself among my life of pricey hobbies and family. Thats why its always an extra beautiful occasion to obtain a piece on the cheap.

I have, as of late, had 2 new gems enter my grips. Might you take a look.

This briefcase made its new home in my daily job as a bail bondsman and bounty hunter after leaving its former life as who knows what. Its tough for me to find perfect briefcases for there are many a criteria. Large enough for legal forms, delicate and proper enough for court, and rugged enough for a bounty hunt.

For $1.00, thats right, $1.00 I found this diamond in the rough at the local rummage. The single solid leather wrapped handle lays in my palm like we were lovers in paradise…. and it awaits my work hour like Mona Lisa in my book shelf.

You may have read HERE and HERE about a commercial we were in for the store Blue 7 in Oklahoma City. If not, catch up! We were graciously paid and reimbursed for our time. One avenue being cash, and another being product. For this reason, during dress fittings I urged the crew that my character would certainly carry the below touted Matt & Nat Vegan duffel as his bocce ball bag. A bit overkill yes, but I had plans for a new overnight bag of my own, and no plans to pay what they were proudly asking.

This bag has become my right hands perspective of home. On occasion it does land as my weekender, but for most time it has taken its life as my guitar pedal bag. Im not playing in any bands as of now. I dont need a constant convenient pedal board set up. Studio life you want as little in your chain as possible, and the ease of getting from one place to the next. Generally securing my beloved music boxes from my home studio to my pal Dustin Tate’s studio, this bag keeps me feeling Rock N Roll even during the drive over.

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February 16, 2011

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The entrance of my new son’s life, Arlo William Smith, told via a badly non thought out stop motion film. You can also watch a stop motion of the brewing of my son Wylder HERE.

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February 08, 2011

Skinning Dead Cows and Screaming Drunk Women

Thursday was a full night. Its rare that I skin a cow and get a $50,000 capture in the same moon. Well, it actually was my first cow skinning, so I suppose the last sentence could have gone unsaid.

Kyle and I have large plans much of the time. 1.3% of those plans come to fruition…. quarterly. The case in point this time are laptop bags and belts made from our own leather. Seeing the prices of leather at Tandy’s, we decided to back it up a step, shoot a cow that had a broken leg and then skin it. We are soon to start the tanning process. You think its gross now, but wait till you ask me where I got that luxurious computer bag. And as Ive blogged before ladies, Kyle is a single man… and willing to skin a cow for you. Well, I havent said the cow part before. And as far as that goes, well not the cow part but the single part, I have a plethora of single friends nearing or in their 30s looking for true love. Hit me up for some digits.

During the cow skinning I got a call from a drunk informant saying she knows the whereabouts of a skip I had. $500 and she’d lead me to her. I bit.

I caught Karissa in the wee hours of that morning in an apartment full of highly intoxicated women celebrating a birthday party and rowdy children in tow. It was loud and messy to say the least. Screaming, crying and shoving did abound. I, for the most part, hate the actual capture of the bounty hunt, though I think its probably supposed to be the best. There are always to many sad factors… and they usually have to do with children. Well children and birds as the story at the end of the blog HERE went. With Karissa’s capture it was that she kept grabbing her 5 yr old niece as protection and then of course the small boy puking from crying so hard, caused by all the women going literally nuts and strangers (me) in the house. He gave me a high five before I left, to make me feel better.

However, after you get the person in the car, away from…. hope I suppose, reality always starts to set in and they get a surge of weight lifting due to the fact they are facing their fear. The fear they had been running from. HERE was that moment with Lee Trevino. Below is that point with Karissa the other night…. well that or that shes still really drunk… yeah, more than likely that shes still really drunk.

In Weatherford, Karissa and I stopped to get some Tylenol PM to help her first night in jail be a little less painful. I sent her in to get them to alleviate (no pun intended) me from any liability. She entered the convenient store wearing her coat backwards to hide the silver hand cuffs. I guess it didnt do the trick. Later as we arrived to the jail, we were greeted with, “Oh, so youre the white guy taxiing the black female in handcuffs in a black Land Rover”. Actually not sure how they didnt catch us on I40 at 4am. I shall change my name to “Stealth Ninja”.

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December 21, 2010

Wylder got “tuck” in a bucket a couple months ago. Mind you, this was the 4th time in a row that he put himself there. Its not as abusive as it seems.

And to boost his ego after that last video, let me say that Wylder has become quite the harmonica player. He couldnt stand Jordan and I being in the studio any longer without him partaking in the event, so we finally caved and let him cut a couple tracks. Enjoy

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December 20, 2010

Thanks, Gang signs & Incestual Tryptophan Comma Kissing Schemes

I figured I should post this Thanksgiving blog before its Christmas. I believe thats social blogging etiquette… that and you dont use white Macintoshes after Labor Day. Ohhh, I wasnt even ready of the cheese of that one.

But honestly, TG was cool. Ive never hosted one, and this was the first year of living in our “technically” finished loft…. and we did it with a bang! 30+ people deriving from the “Fite” ancestry, which was my Wifes maiden name. Well, at least they had something to do with the name Fite.

We partied pretty hard, and here is some proof via “multimedia” as people in churches usually still tend to call it.

First things first, we ate… and dont even get me started on the Fite family Kraut and weenies tradition at TG. Its disgusting and impolite for that reason and 100 more.

The big adult table…(boring..jk)

Kids area

The “Are we adults yet?” table

Soon after the sugars of dessert had melted into the blood stream, all broke loose.

Wayne (yes the homeless guy who lived in our building) impressions.

Crazy middle class white woman gang signs/musical poster faces

I dont even know what this is, but I know that my child in the middle is actually the least entertaining to watch.

It should have, but it didnt stop there… Theres a pregnant woman cha cha if you wait on it

incestual tryptophan comma kissing schemes

And…. sitting politely on the couch…. Ok, I just wanted to show a pic of my bookcase in the afternoon TG Day sun. So sue me

The party soon steered into the studio for family jam band.

Fites vs Eagles… and yes that is me on the shaker…. and youre welcome

Then family portraits….. Wait, howd that get in there?

Jordan, Marielle and I started cutting some real tracks which Jordan came to finish up later that night, however, Wylder had his own jam hashed out on the harmonica… Actually I think Ill have to reblog this one on its own blog.

Lots of Thanks

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December 19, 2010

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Parade Parties, Chubs and Bounty Hunts

The Christmas Parade Watch Party at our home was a flippin’ blast! Well actually I got there as the last “float” chugged by. I had missed the bulk of my own 70+ people party because of a bounty hunt. Bummer indeed, but I was glad to get in the $50,000 skip to keep my job so I can keep having parties… run on sentence, check… on a side note, the bounty hunt was pretty intense and made the newspaper the next day. Ended up, after 2 doors kicked in (one by moi), a misfired 25’ taser cartridge (again by moi), and a fully searched house, including the attic (not by moi, allergic to insulation), he was hiding in the couch under his mom, bro and cousin. Yes, in the couch. After Jon threw off a cushion and yelled “Ohhhh, Im seein a hand here” he came curling out of the couch like a snake.

The Party:

For those not in the know, we reside 2nd floor on our towns main street, so all the parades are a perfect site from our front windows . No, capitalize “main street” i did not. Our random towns main street is not called “Main st”… its Frisco. Im not sure why… maybe its the same reason they chose a frankly correct city logo that reads “Chub City of Western Oklahoma.”

Yes, the big “C” would read fine, except that they use it in other instances where it starts both words…. so the guessing is left up to you, the reader, when to include the “C” to the second line…. and from what I see around here, “Chub” is the only right answer

Ok..let start this again… The Party:

Highligts are…..

-Did I already say 70+ people!

-DJ FIVE 80 threw a wicked mix of Christmas/dance/jazz/party music. His set up is legit. Hire him. *Djs never get love from the camera. What up?*

-Photo Booth turned out to be great fun.

Caleb set up his rig in front of our make shift booth and snapped away (along with his assistant, & my niece Marielle.. seen with me above). Lots took advantage of a first for the season Christmas pic. See all the results HERE

Lets wrap it up:

I completely forgot to take photos at the party, as I was a bit scatter brained from my earlier engagement… So, pics are scarce. I grabbed a few from a friend… but the pickins were slim.

Meri, hostin the mostin

The young and the… young at heart can always find common ground around a fire

Sometimes after party hang outs are the most fun of all

Until next year….. CPWP 2011

I have always been fascinated by the musician Bill Mallonee of the band "Vigilantes of Love" who would write "must emote." with sharpie on his left forearm to prevent apathy from creeping into his nightly performance. This way he would constantly be reminded by seeing the words while playing his guitar. It seems life is always making sure to write "must emote." all over my arm.

I would love to get to know you. Send me your blog link or life details to my EMAIL. I guess I am an entrepreneur or sorts. For employment I write bail bonds/bounty hunt, co-run Holy Clap! and Must Emote Design & Print Studios. I have a thrilling WIFE, who is an independently published author and the owner of a business called SMITTY BABY, and even GREW TWO HUMANS in her stomach for us, WYLDER and ARLO. I make a career as a full time bounty hunter/bail bondsman but graduated university with a major in Classical Guitar Performance and minors in Marketing and Recreatoinal Leadership. Anything at my fingertips I claim as a hobby, but a few of the things that sit deep in my soul are MUSIC, though I have little in recorded format, CLIMBING, to which I would be glad to TEACH you, TRAVELLING, especially by thumb, WOOD WORKING and HARVESTING, which Im still a rookie at with THIS being my only great feat, MAKING HORRIBLE FILMS, and of course playing Limbo and or Shooting The Duck in ROLLER SKATES.... Oh, and run-on sentences. I hope we become friends.

A Leather Tote Floats My Boat

Skinning Dead Cows and Screaming Drunk Women

Thanks, Gang signs & Incestual Tryptophan Comma Kissing Schemes

Parade Parties, Chubs and Bounty Hunts

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