Hoard Explorer

The neoprene carrying case which came with my missing Bose bluetooth earbuds.

I tried to throw this neoprene earbud case away recently. But instead of sending it off to the landfill, it became the focus of this episode. I honestly don’t know why I kept it this long. It belonged to the Bose earbuds I lost, so even the case is premium quality. But really, it’s not that great. Certainly not as cool as my expensive pocket knife. The only time I ever pulled a knife on anybody was at a roadhouse in the lush rural wilds south of New Orleans. A man named Nichol Dance violently smashed my cassette recorder on the ground and I feared for my life. If you’re at one remove, you’re already too far gone.

NOTE: I am switching to a bi-weekly release schedule, so no drop next Thursday! Please come back September 16 for Episode 33 of the Hoard Explorer podcast.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #neoprene #earbud #bose #psychoacoustics #variances #pocketknife #sheepsfoot #bayou #shrimp #boat #captain #minivan #cassette #powerboats

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

A collectable plate featuring a monthly calendar for 1973 & personified seasons.

This is a plate with a stylized 1973 in the middle of a dense line drawing dominated by a cloud motif. Amidst the clouds are vaguely greek personifications of the four seasons, with outlines and postures that you might see in a map of constellations. I used to take my first girlfriend to the top of a five story train bridge over the Napa River to make out and look up at the stars. But the best stargazing I ever did was on the roof of a borrowed broken minivan on a soft shoulder in deepest darkest West Texas. I never got the hang of astrology, though I never really tried. I’m still trying to get the hang of philosophy but I’m not holding my breath. History is a little easier, and I keep a running list of noteworthy events that transpired in the year 1973. Did you know that Governor Ronald Reagan was across town from me at the moment of my birth?

NOTE: I am switching to a bi-weekly release schedule, so no drop next Thursday! Please come back September 2 for Episode 32 of the Hoard Explorer podcast.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #plate #calendar #alamo #gipper #universe #hegel #eforeffort #college #trainbridge #minivan #awful #y2k #gemini

I typically don’t throw out medicine that I’ve been prescribed. Even if I no longer need it, even if it has expired, I put it in the plastic zipper bag I have set aside for such an occasion. It’s not a cherished possession, and I probably wouldn’t care if it disappeared. But I don’t want to throw it away. Sometimes I need some old muscle relaxers if my herniated disc acts up and it’s nice to know it’s there if I need it. I remember the first time I ever had a back attack, on a road trip back east back when I was a misguided college student. I blame Bak Shaolin Eagle Claw kung fu but I admit it’s only conjecture.

NOTE: I am switching to a bi-weekly release schedule, so no drop next Thursday! Please come back August 19 for Episode 31 of the Hoard Explorer podcast.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #drugs #expired #pain #real #natural #rational #irrational #imaginary #nondenumerable #i #xday #conspiracy #1998 #subgenius

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

A hand-thrown ceramic vase, titled and signed by the potter.

I found a tall ceramic vase at the Goodwill across the parking lot from the Walmart in Windsor, CA. The vase is embellished with a pair of bronze female silhouettes, sort of primitive cubist nudes. There’s a label taped to the base reading “Spirit Women”. I can make out a signature imprinted in the clay beneath but I can’t bring myself to remove the label for some reason. When I recently unpacked the vase after moving to my new house, I discovered within this vase a small handful of eucalyptus leaves, a dozen pine catkins, and some dirt. I threw out the dirt but replaced the leaves and catkins and I’m at a loss to explain why. Sometimes my own behavior is a mystery to me.

NOTE: There will be no new episode on July 29 for reasons I explain herein. Please come back August 5 for Episode 30 of the Hoard Explorer podcast.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #spiritwomen #ceramic #catkin #testosterone #behavior #roadrage #norcal #archetypes #definitions #judgement #penpal

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

In 2015, at my mom’s house in Napa, I recorded myself while digging through some boxes of ephemera from The Hoard. The main Hoard, the motherlode, the deep cuts. This was a completely extemporaneous “first episode” of a podcast memoir concept I had been noodling on for months. I had planned on literally burning with fire the contents of each box after reviewing each bit in turn, describing and reminiscing and then incrementally ceremonially disposing of a lifetime’s collection of cherished worthless stuff. I actually did end up burning some of it in the backyard of my childhood home, but I abandoned that project along with the Hoard Explorer podcast. It was years before I could summon up the courage to give it another go.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #episode1 #2015 #ephemera #extemporaneous #fail 

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

Support this podcast by purchasing Creamer Dog for $1,000. Comes with NFT certificate of authenticity. DM me for details.

An arrangement of things from the former Table of Wonders for the purposes of divination.

As I’m putting up some knick knacks around my new digs, I can’t help but notice the the way the assemblages always seem to add up to something. In particular there’s this built-in desk at the base of the stairs to the top floor. Here are numerous built-in cubbies above the desk that are just perfect for interesting hoard objects, and when all the cubbies are full I think it reads like some kind of heterodox tarot card. Or at the very least the desk becomes imbued with arcane symbolism just waiting to be deciphered to those who dare. In my early teens I was a camp counselor and I remember getting in trouble for trying to do a tarot reading for my prepubescent wards. Today I’m going to read from the Desk of God as if it were prophesy and I don’t have to worry about getting in trouble (I hope).

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #desk #tarot #kabbalah #death #gabriel #hermes #jvtv #mariachi #headlessone #beyond #queen #goat #king #sheep #thelefthandofdarkess #turtlesallthewaydown

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

Support this podcast by purchasing Creamer Dog for $1,000. Comes with NFT certificate of authenticity.

A tall ceramic penguin in my backyard.

Paul is a ceramic penguin who lives in my backyard. He took up in a weedy patch of rocks bounded on one side by a short length of knee-high wire fencing. Paul has a blank, slightly surprised stare which suggests an inner serenity. He is an object of contemplation for me, or more like a locus of attention while I myself space out. I could happily sit in my back yard staring at Paul, indefinitely. And if I stare at myself staring at Paul, it's called mindfulness. We’re all just energy, specifically clouds of resonating waveforms. Paul gets it, but I've got a long way to go.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #paul #penguin #homology #vipassana #hebephrenia #heroinhotel #mentalmodels #sadhu #phillipkdick

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

Hoard Explorer also has a magic money concept store on eBay!

https://www.ebay.com/usr/hoardexplorer

Support this podcast by purchasing Creamer Dog for $1,000. Comes with NFT certificate of authenticity.

A handful of pointless audio clips from my digital archive.

I have a substantial collection of field recordings that I’ve amassed indiscriminately over the years. This episode is a clip show of sorts, a little audio menagerie that is representative of the sort of unnecessary recordings that I nevertheless feel compelled to store indefinitely. Back in Napa there is a pile of cassette tapes which capture a very early iteration of myself, back when I had a cassette recording schtick where I would claim to be a journalist just to get people to talk to me “on tape”. I wish I had access to those right now. But tape does not exist in the cloud, so I’ll have to settle for more recent material. You’ll get some fly-on-the-wall snippets of quotidian me, moments that are at once irreplaceable and totally uninteresting. 

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #catan #firsttuesday #portcosta #sitkaspruce #hoytus #dalecooper #fieldrecording #tonguetwisters #cassette #scleepy #technicaldifficulties

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

Hoard Explorer also has a magic money concept store on eBay!

https://www.ebay.com/usr/hoardexplorer

Support this podcast by purchasing Creamer Dog for $1,000. Comes with NFT certificate of authenticity.

Two large densely-packed tubs of miscellaneous fabric.

Dorothy spent most of her life ensconced in work that involved fabric. I got the impression that her career ran the gamut from clothing to interior design and everything in between. I didn’t know her but I met her granddaughter who explained the yard sale to me. Maybe the most singular yard sale I’d ever witnessed. The entire front yard and virtually all available floor space indoors was crowded with fabric. Yards and yards and yards of fabric collected over a lifetime which had lately come to pass. Crowds of people walked off with trunkloads of fabric and the piles never seemed to shrink. The hashtag  #dorothysfabric was created to track how her late grandmother’s fabric was being used. An unexpected legacy and a fine tribute to Dorothy’s life’s work. We are now storing two great big tubs of Dorothy's fabric. 

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #dorothysfabric #legacy #tribute #milleunaceramica #tatemodern #instagram #oz #sewistsofinstagram #americankennelclub #monomania #anagnorisis #lifelongpassion #noodlenoodlenoodle

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

Hoard Explorer also has a magic money concept store on eBay!

https://www.ebay.com/usr/hoardexplorer

Support this podcast by purchasing Creamer Dog for $1,000. Comes with NFT certificate of authenticity.

A heavy mirror in weathered frame purchased at the cat store.

This is a conversation I had with Zac about his grandparents’ “intense relationship with objects”. The patrilineal branch of his family exhibits a profound thriftiness and aversion to waste, born of formative midwestern experiences in the Great Depression. The matrilineal branch was consumed with collecting artifacts rather than needful things, amassing a large and wondrous trove of aboriginal art and craftwork from around the globe. There’s evidence that both these tendencies find expression in Zac’s own proclivities. On top of this, his life as a writer and dance critic has layered a librarian’s sensibility with regards to his lifetime’s collection of ephemera. This hoard is destined to be folded into a historical archive, at which point it will transcend him as a personal possession. He loves being a good custodian of his shit.

hoardexplorer.com #hoardexplorer #memoir #mirror #dance #gillianwearing #timeoutchicago #silverspace #legacy #archive #phone #marquetry #squidink #desertstorm #custodian

Hoard Explorer also has a music show on Freeform Portland community radio!

https://www.freeformportland.org/program/hoard-explorer-music-dump/

Listen to past episodes of Hoard Explorer’s Music Dump on Mixcloud:

https://www.mixcloud.com/hoardexplorer/

Hoard Explorer also has a magic money concept store on eBay!

https://www.ebay.com/usr/hoardexplorer

Support this podcast by purchasing Creamer Dog for $1,000. Comes with NFT certificate of authenticity.