i just got back from talking to the dalai lama in philadelphia.
it's not every day i get to start an update/journal entry/blog(i hate that word) with that sentence.
in fact, well, just today.
to begin: i went to philadelphia last night with serj from system of a down and kt tunstall and joss stone to meet
up with the dalai lama today and hang out and talk informally.
well, 'informally' insofar as 'informally' involves bomb sniffing dogs and secret service agents an...

i just got back from talking to the dalai lama in philadelphia.
it's not every day i get to start an update/journal entry/blog(i hate that word) with that sentence.
in fact, well, just today.
to begin: i went to philadelphia last night with serj from system of a down and kt tunstall and joss stone to meet
up with the dalai lama today and hang out and talk informally.
well, 'informally' insofar as 'informally' involves bomb sniffing dogs and secret service agents and camera crews and attendants.
but i'm getting ahead of myself.
we arrived in philly last night and had dinner at horizons(which is fantastic, even if the name 'horizons' sounds
kind of new-age-y and vague).
and then last night after dinner i was asking myself, 'ok, you're meeting h.h dalai lama in the morning, what
do you want to talk about with him?'
and i was kind of stumped.
a part of me wanted to ask fun and lighthearted questions, like 'if you were a breakdancer what would
you want for your breakdancing name?' or 'if you could go on vacation anywhere, where would you go and what would you do?'
or 'do you prefer pantera or slayer?'
and another part of me wanted to ask more serious questions about dharma and meditation and politics and quantum mechanics.
but then i thought that he probably gets asked serious questions all the time, so maybe he'd like
the more lighthearted questions.
then i thought that maybe the lighthearted questions would be deemed offensive or irreverent.
and then it was morning.
serj and kt and joss and i met for breakfast and drank too much coffee and talked about what we'd
talk about with h.h.d.l.
we were shuffled into a small conference room.  we met some very nice tibetan people and some nice
mongolian people and some nice los angeleno people and some nice secret service people and nice
camera crews and so on.
and then it started to get odd.
i went upstairs to go to the giftshop to see if i could buy a blank cd, cos i had this idea that i'd
burn a cd for the dalai lama, maybe some relaxing music he could listen to on long flights.
they didn't have blank cd's in the gift shop, but snoop dogg and his posse were leaving the hotel
just as the dalai lama was arriving.
postmodernism reared it's messy head, and the dogg pound posed for pictures with h.h. dalai lama.
this, needless to say, was entertaining.
then h.h.d.l had some lunch.
then h.h.d.l came downstairs for his informal meeting with us.
he walked into the room(preceded by security people).
he smiled at us.
he played with serj's beard.
he shook our hands and smiled some more.
then we sat down for the meeting.
kt tunstall played a song for him(it was a very nice song, a new song inspired by 'the giving tree'.).
hhdl closed his eyes and listened and then we talked about meditation(well, he talked, we listened).
i asked him if he could do any job for a week other than being the dalai lama what would it be?
at first he said that he'd like to do something to protect the environment.
then i asked, 'but what if you could be completely selfish for a week, what would you do?'
'sleep.' he said.
'so you'd be a professional sleeper?' i asked.
and he laughed and laughed.
and boy, when the dalai lama laughs at one of your jokes(even if it's not such a good joke) you feel pretty good.
serj asked him about spirituality and justice.  joss asked him about the situation with tibet and china.
we chatted informally(under the watchful eye of secret service and camera crews and attendants and translators
and well-trained monkeys...ok, no monkeys.  but monkeys would've been good, as everyone seems to like monkeys).
we took a whole bunch of pictures, we said our goodbyes, and he left to further spread the causes of peace and compassion to
the good people of philadelphia.
hopefully at some point i'll get the pictures back so that you'll know i wasn't just hallucinating.
or was i?  was i actually having an ambien inspired hallucination?
nope, cos i have the commemorative t-shirt.  unless hallucinations can produce commemorative t-shirts, which i don't
think they can.
and how would i describe h.h dalai lama?
mainly i was struck by his intellect.  he might be the brightest person i've ever met.
secondly i was struck by his sense of humor.  whenever he got the chance to make a little joke he made a little joke, and he
genuinely laughed whenever anything funny(or even quasi-funny, like my quips)was said.
thirdly i was kind of in awe, so i didn't have the perspective from which to objectively assess the situation or the man.
ok, so that was my day.  now i'm headed out to a barbecue with mayor corey booker, who is a remarkable politician
and might be president someday.
some days are way more interesting than other days.
this was a way more interesting day than most.
thanks,
moby

this is from a friend of mine at hsus about proposition 2 in california.
please do what you can to help the $20/20 campaign.
thanks,
moby

I'm hoping you can help us help 20 million farm animals in California.

As you know, we're in full support of Proposition 2 (www.YesOnProp2.org), a measure that will appear on this November's ballot in California that, if passed, will ban the cruelest and most inhumane confinement of 20 million farm animals in the stat...

this is from a friend of mine at hsus about proposition 2 in california.
please do what you can to help the $20/20 campaign.
thanks,
moby

I'm hoping you can help us help 20 million farm animals in California.

As you know, we're in full support of Proposition 2 (www.YesOnProp2.org), a measure that will appear on this November's ballot in California that, if passed, will ban the cruelest and most inhumane confinement of 20 million farm animals in the state--hens in battery cages, breeding pigs in gestation crates, and calves in veal crates.

This historic effort will hopefully be the beginning of the end of factory farming confinement practices in the country!

Unfortunately, corporate agribusiness interests have put in more than $1million to defeat this measure over the past two weeks alone, and they plan to pump in millions more. To counter this big money, I'm calling on all my friends to help.

Can you help spread the word about the $20/20 Campaign? If everyone we know gives just $20 (or more!) to help these 20 million animals who are so intensively confined in battery cages, gestation crates and veal crates that they cannot even fully extend their limbs and many can't even turn around, we can raise the much-needed funds to combat agribusiness's funnelling of extraordinary amounts of money into defeating this measure that would so significantly and positively impact animals.

Donations are accepted at https://secure.hsus.org/01/chf_2020

some politics and etc:

1-john mccain's top economic advisor today called americans 'a nation of whiners' because americans were upset about their economic problems.
mccain's top economic advisor, phil gramm, has basically said that america's economic problems
are 'mental', as in they're all in people's heads.
huh.  that might be hard to explain to people who are unemployed, can't pay for their kids medical bills, and have
just had their house foreclosed ...

some politics and etc:

1-john mccain's top economic advisor today called americans 'a nation of whiners' because americans were upset about their economic problems.
mccain's top economic advisor, phil gramm, has basically said that america's economic problems
are 'mental', as in they're all in people's heads.
huh.  that might be hard to explain to people who are unemployed, can't pay for their kids medical bills, and have
just had their house foreclosed on.
oh, john mccain said that he stands by what his economic advisor said.
what a well run campaign...

2-jesse jackson said that he'd like to 'cut his(obama's)nuts off'.  sour grapes?  sorry, that was a bad pun.
i mean, isn't it just possible that jesse jackson, an african-american politician who ran for president about 18,000 times,
is bummed out that obama will be the nations first african-american politician?
maybe jesse should start wearing a ball-gag when he appears in public.  in addition to being practical(in that it would
keep him from speaking when people might be listening)it would also show his solidarity with the b&d community.

3-have you ever taken ambien?  i was on a flight recently and i was sitting next to a very professional business woman.
i'm guessing she was 48 years old, very affluent and successful and poised.  15 minutes into the flight she took an ambien
and went to sleep.  90 minutes later she woke up, looked at me and said 'i like your glasses'.  she took my glasses and tried them
on.  she then sat for a second, farted very loudly, and went back to sleep.
when she woke up later i could tell that she had absolutely no recollection of waking up and taking my glasses and farting
loudly.
i love that ambien makes people crazy.  it's like a 2-in-1 drug.  it helps people to sleep and it makes them crazy, like
the simpsons episode where homer becomes a zombie and bart uses him as his personal zombie slave.
my caveat to people: if you're flying and you want to sleep you might want to think twice about what sleep drugs
you're taking.  some sleep drugs probably should be reconsidered at 38,000 feet in the company of complete strangers.

i guess that's all for now.
i hope you're having a good summer(or winter if you're in the southern hemisphere, like patagonia.  i've always
wanted to go to patagonia.  probably in the summer.  our winter.  their summer.  just to be clear), and hopefully i'll
see you soon.
moby

the kind people at my management company got tired of me being ignorant, so they sent me a list
of all of the upcoming live and dj events that i have:

Upcoming events:
Jul 19 Loveparade Dortmund [DJ Set], Germany
Jul 20 Circle Of Love [DJ Set] Dortmund, Germany
Jul 20 Flamingo Night [DJ Set] Bloemendaal, The Netherlands
Jul 22 Avalanche Records [DJ Set] Glasgow, UK
Jul 22 Mono [Acoustic...

the kind people at my management company got tired of me being ignorant, so they sent me a list
of all of the upcoming live and dj events that i have:

Upcoming events:
Jul 19 Loveparade Dortmund [DJ Set], Germany
Jul 20 Circle Of Love [DJ Set] Dortmund, Germany
Jul 20 Flamingo Night [DJ Set] Bloemendaal, The Netherlands
Jul 22 Avalanche Records [DJ Set] Glasgow, UK
Jul 22 Mono [Acoustic] Glasgow, UK
Jul 24 Cup [Acoustic] Manchester, UK
Jul 24 TBA [DJ Set] Manchester, UK
Jul 25 Global Gathering [Live:Remixed] Stratford-Upon-Avon, UK
Jul 26 The Liquid Room [DJ Set] Edinburgh, UK
Aug 2 Vision [DJ set] Chicago, Illinois
Aug 8 SonneMondSterne [Live:Remixed] Saalberg, Germany
Aug 10 Virgin Festival [DJ Set] Baltimore, Maryland

more stuff will be added, but this is the list of everything i'm doing this summer.
hopefully see you soon,
moby