Sunday, July 02, 2006

SKETCH IDEAS & GHOSTS IN THE SQUARE

I've been bouncing ideas around with friends for some future youtube sketches or short podcast bits. I'm jotting them down here before they go to mental la la land.

(1) an ad for Emo Elmo - complete with black eyeliner, safety pins in his lip, and depressing sentiments. Who wouldn't rush out and buy one?

(2) little kids prank calling 911 - admit it; you did it, too. How mad was your mom?

(3) oh man, this one is gone already, and I knew it when I started typing this list...Does that ever happen to you?

On Friday, I got an unexpected invitation from Ryan to drive up to Oxford for Ole Miss' Shakespeare Festival. I enjoyed the plays and meeting his friends from the theater department there. We saw Rowan Oak and walked around the Square.

My mom's family is from Oxford, so while we walked around town, I started reading the dates on the buildings and thought about my great-grandparents and grandparents walking those same sidewalks seeing the same sights. There is a DVD store that has a display of antique TV's in the window. As I stood looking at them, I remembered that my mom first saw a TV in an Oxford Square storefront window. There I stood over 50 years later looking at a similar set. I liked experiencing that feeling of history.

We stayed at Ryan's college roommate's century-old farmhouse in Water Valley (about 20 minutes away). My dad's family lived in that town for many years; his grandfather ran the railroad there. So this weekend turned out to be a bit of a homecoming for me.