Ojai: Talk of the Town

Users can also earn tokens through time and meditation quality, which can be redeemed on the platform for extra classes and merchandise. Sanehood's AI is also free, and hopes to remain so. They hope to earn money through donations, grants, upgraded services and products.

The project began when Vu Dang, who knew Gray from the Ojai Valley Athletic Club, asked for his help developing the app. Vu Dang is a software engineer who received his master's degree just three years out of high school, and has extensive experience with data analytics. Vu Dang has been meditating since age 9 and also leads vipanassa meditations. Gray works for a defense contractor as an electrical engineer, and is also a committed meditator.

The two began working after hours to develop the app, and are just about ready to launch. Their ambitious goal is to sign up one billion people for this meditation tool, and their urgency is driven by the amount of depression and mental health issues that exploded during and after the pandemic. They also expect people to build supportive communities about meditation through the app.

Gray talked about how uncannily accurate the AI has been against baseline scores and control groups, and how it is constantly learning and improving as it learns more about the user, and more about the entire community of users.

We did not talk about Uighur detention camps, ancient Arabian irrigation technologies or howler monkeys.

https://sanehood.com/

Colonel (Ret.) Keith Nightingale has been helping ferry supplies to Ukraine through Poland, including boxes of Ojai citrus, which is much welcomed on the front lines in the eastern portion of the country. Nightingale brings us through the current state of the conflict, the fierce resistance being mounted by Ukraine, the structural advantages with their armed forces that help neutralize Russia's massive numerical advantage and possibly outcomes for this conflict.

Nightingale said that Ukraine was able to tilt the playing field thanks to NATO's support with long-range artillery, including the HIMARS, with which the Ukraine can target, with great precision, Russia's supply depots, leaving them unable to field an effective force. He described the Ukrainians as fighting with three components; the front-line, battle hardened troops which are devastating Russia, the "couch potato brigade" which is operating drones with deadly effect, as well as hacking Russian systems, and the third component - the volunteers, who at the war's outbreak, would head down to the police station to pick up an AK-47. Thanks to their local knowledge and support, they have been proven to be decisive in urban combat.

We discuss Putin's dwindling options, China's next moves, the top-down command structure and lack of non-commissioned officers that slow down battlefield decisions and leave Russian forces vulnerable to a fleet, flexible fighting force. 

Nightingale grew up in Ojai during a different age, and we also spend time talking about the changes, good and bad, and his journey into a career in the military during the early days of Vietnam. We also talk about bears and their cunning when it comes to garbage cans, Anselmo "Chummo" Quijada, Ojai's one-man gang task force who kept many local boys on the straight and narrow, and much else. We did not talk about ash baseball bats, Viktor Frankl or hang gliding.

The Dobbs vs. Jackson Women's Health Organization ended 50 years of the Roe v. Wade era, in which abortion was settled law. In doing so, the Supreme Court unleashed a wave of outrage, anger and despair, and blunted what the expected "red wave" in the midterm elections. Susan Kelejian, director of the Ojai Valley Artists Theater Ensemble (OVATE), went to her board with a plan to create an applied theater project, which took as its inspiration Greek mythology, particularly Aeschylus' "Orestes" and its themes of matricide of Clytemnestra, and his  judgment for his crime by the Furies. 

The project, which fits into the experiential or devised theater model, will involve several dozen women in a multi-media production, focusing around themes of misogyny and betrayal. While the schedule has not yet been set, Kelejian and Harrington expect to begin public performances in March. The cast of several dozen, predominately female, many between ages 18 and 25. 

The two have been working together for years and were astounded by how much they had in common in their "parallel lives." They have a goal of exporting the FuryUs model to other local theaters to build their own adaptations. 

We also talked about Antonin Artaud and the Living Theater, the history of oppression, how Kelejian's day job as a therapist, and Harrington's interest in ancient Greece, fits into the project, audience attention spans, global warming, and healing through the arts.

For more information, check out the profile in the Winter issue of Ojai Quarterly.

The OVATE website is Ovate.org. The original casting call read, "Are you angry, frustrated, tapped out, or numb about what’s going on in the world? Are you feeling like you want to scream, cry, rage, and wail against the thousands of years of gender-specific oppression and need an outlet that is creative and mindful Are you FURIOUS? We are ...

October 27-30 is the annual Ojai Storytellers Festival, one of the premier events on the storytelling circuit. This year they've added what Kara called "a mini-Shakespeare Festival" with Deb Newbold's acclaimed "King Lear, Retold," the music group Merry Wives of Windsor, the Sheriffs of Schroedingham and the return of Ojai's own Madrigali Singers. Sheila Arnold will be the master of ceremonies, and Kevin Kling, Izzy Tooinsky, Josh Goforth, Mara Menzies and Adam Booth.

Katz, who has been a storyteller for decades, talks about the ancient art and craft, the camaraderie on the circuit and how important stories are as the connective tissue of our culture. We also talked about the National Storytellers Festival in Jonesborough, Tennessee which both Michael and Kara said was/is a life-changing event, the process of creating stories, the back-and-forth with the audience, different approaches to reaching the audience and the importance of connection.

We did not talk about the lattice theory of quarks, the bronzes of Benin or the great lost libraries of Alexandria and Constantinopole.

Shane and Aaron Harris, along with trainer Bruce Siben, operate the American Legend Mustang, a nonprofit group based at the 22-acre River Rock Ranch. The crew picks up mustangs from the Bureau of Land Management at their corral in Ridgecrest, bring them back to Ojai, and train them to the saddle. In the four years they've been operating, they've adopted out about two dozen horses.

The BLM rounds up the wild horses from their range in the West, typically Utah and Nevada's Great Basin, often at the behest of local ranchers who find their cattle competing for forage in the rough and wild country. Shane said "I went to pick up one horse and ended up with three," falling in love with the creatures. Aaron said the horses, despite the trauma of being herded into catchment corrals with helicopters, can be gentled into being petted in one day. With Bruce's natural horse training, horses can be ridden within one to two months months under ideal conditions. Many of the adopters keep their mustangs corralled at the ranch.

ALM has several internship and volunteer programs ready to resume after the two-year pandemic hiatus, and are making major renovations at the ranch for public events and new facilities. The nonprofit will be featured in the coming issue of Ojai Quarterly.

We also talk about the fascinating history of mustangs, many descended from escapees from conquistadors, and how quickly Native American tribes in the West adapted to a nomadic horse culture, becoming expert riders within just a few generations. The ALM's plans for expanded programs and adoptions also came in for discussion. Shane Harris' prior career as a CHP officer and hairdresser, Aaron's web savvy and Bruce's horse trainer role models were part of the wide-ranging discussion as well.

We did not talk about Comanche chief Quanah Parker, Viking burial sites or Irish stew recipes.

Ojai's own Rain Perry, singer-songwriter known for her lyrical prowess and crystal-clear voice, has been working on a one-woman show, which opens Thursday, October 13 and runs through October 22nd (Thursday, Friday and Saturday both weekends) at Kim Maxwell Studio,  226 West Ojai Avenue, #102. All shows are at 8 p.m.

The show is named after David Foster Wallace's viral commencement address, "This Is Water," which emphasizes the true purpose of education and empathy. Perry was wrestling with questions of race and identity during the pandemic and George Floyd protests and found it the perfect metaphor. The show includes eight songs from her 9-song album "A White Album" which was just released and available on Itunes and Spotify or through her website. It debuted on the Folk Music Chart at no. 11 and has received rave reviews, including Glide Magazine's "it distill(s) complicated issues fraught with politics and passion through a prism of compassion and understanding."

Bill Bentley of Americana Highways magazine wrote, "There are times on "A White Album" where the whole thing feels like it is making the world tilt in a new direction. These are songs which are perfectly capable of giving life a whole new meaning. People like Rain Perry don’t come around that often. They just don’t."

Perry said one message is for white people to acknowledge their privilege and to question each other, or, as she said, "Calling people in," rather than calling them out. She also used the folk expression, "Collect your cousins," for a reckoning on race and culture.

This play is being directed by Kim Maxwell, who also directed Rain's much-acclaimed 2008 show, "Cinderblock Bookshelves," with accompaniment from Austin, Texas-based Mark Hallman. Perry said that a grant from the Ojai Arts Commission helped produce the play as well.  It "was a sequel of sorts to 'Cinderblock Bookshelves'," she said. “I want to look back at my same childhood, but this time through the lens of race.”

Hallman, owner of the iconic Congress House studio, has produced music by Carole King, Tom Russell (who recorded one of Rain's songs) and Eliza Gylkison and Ani Di Franco. He was the subject of a well-received 2016 documentary film, "The Shopkeeper," that Perry wrote and directed about the post-Napster travails of the music business, through Hallman's and other musicians' struggles to stay afloat in the streaming era.

Perry talked about growing up in Ojai, her eccentric family, early mentors and raising her children, as well as sharing insights into the creative side of her life, the success of selling a song, "Beautiful Tree," that became the theme of a popular CW Network show, "Life Unexpected," and her song "Yosemite" has been recorded by Tom Russell and Nanci Griffith.

We did not talk about Lake Casitas storage capacity, how grasshoppers turn into locusts or how Auguste Escoffier's military service informed his "brigade de cuisine" system.

For more information:

www.rainperry.com/this_is_water

Rain Perry's "White Album" which includes all nine songs on her show.

David Foster Wallace's 2005 commencement address at Kenyon College: www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhhC_N6Bm_s

Franz Lidz is one of very few return guests on the Ojai podcast. If you check out his earlier appearance (Episode 24, Aug. 27th, 2020) you can see why we were eager to have him back.

His recent feature in the Los Angeles Times about Ojai's new restaurant scene was widely read and discussed, but that was only the tip of the spear for our wide-ranging discussion. Lidz' career has included decades at Sports Illustrated, and now he is a frequent contributor to Smithsonian Magazine, with insightful, witty and irreverent features that bring to life often dusty and overlooked fields like archaeology and science. He is also an author, his popular book "Unstrung Heroes" about his eccentric uncles was made into the 1991 film of the same name. Besides journalism, Lidz also spent time as an executive with the Detroit Pistons.

We talk about how his circuitous career led him to Ojai, what he thinks about the local restaurant scene and food culture in general, why journalism is more important than ever, and what a vibrant, inclusive Ojai would look like (rent control, anyone?).

We did not talk about Viking burial customs, the use of slippery elm powder in baseball or the great labor strikes of the 1930s.

Jonathan Fraser Light is a renowned trial attorney in Ventura County, who has spent decades writing the acclaimed 1,112 page "Cultural Encyclopedia of Baseball," a compendium this incredible lens through which to view American history. For example, the Civil Right Era properly began when Brooklyn Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey offered a contract to a standout UCLA football running back and returning World War II veteran named Jackie Robinson.

Rising to popularity during the Civil War, Light makes an air-tight case that baseball has etched itself on to the national psyche like nothing else. He sorts through thousands of entries about baseball's iconic status through advertising, agents, illegal substances, alcohol, superstitions, youngest and oldest players and brief bios of players, team owners, inventors, odd coincidences and fascinating facts about the American past-time.

Ojai's baseball connections include prominent resident Fred Snodgrass, who after a distinguished career in baseball for the New York Giants and as a local bankers, was remembered most for a key dropped ball in the 1912 World Series. We also talked about Light's journey into the dark recesses of baseball arcana with his discovery of Lou Gehrig's will.

Gaylord Perry's home run, Tom Seaver's arrogance, Tony Gwynn's weight issues, Ted Williams' splendid splintering, Moneyball and the best and worst baseball movies of all time also come in for this rollicking conversation. Also, Pete Rose's wife saying, "I wish I was second base, I'd see my husband more." Light also makes the case that the Angels' Shohei Ohtani might be the greatest baseball player of all time.

We did not talk about the failed invasion of Canada during the War of 1812, the Chicago fire of 1877 or Ojai's Great Whipped Cream Shortage of 2022.