Josh profile picture

Josh

Always celebrate the yes.

About Me

Conceived in Hawaii, born in Virginia, raised in Corvallis and unleashed upon Portland. I am an Oregonian, an artist, a musician, an activist and a writer. I make an effort to spend most of my time having fun and doing cool stuff. I am the real Josh Gates - don't fall for any of those imitation profiles.

Check out my band's music page by clicking here .

View my pics for samples of artwork and digital photography.

My Interests

..Stretching. Reading. Libraries rock. Art: mainly drawing and oil painting. Playing music: guitar, drums, bass... writing and arranging songs...rocking out in bands, as singer-songwriter or as drummer, and in solo projects that I enjoy recording at home. Canvassing: Getting paid to walk around talking to people about politics. Cooking good food. Nutrition. Gleaning. Going to shows. Doing cool stuff. Backpacking. Minor league baseball. Whupping a horse's ass with a belt (figuratively). Lucid dreaming. Bowling. Shooting pool. Mind-blowing, two-hour-long sex. Riding the bus. Walking around. Cycling. The game of world domination. Brunettes. Water. Writing, in the form of short stories or poems or just journal entries about interesting stuff. The random conversations you have with strangers. Justice in Portland. A cup of coffee and a cigarette. Rhinos are pretty cool.

I'd like to meet:



Wes Jones, the national top dog at Grassroots Campaigns, Inc... so I can sit down with him and discuss my demands for ethical compensation in the canvassing industry.

Also, anyone in the following categories is pretty much automatically cool: Canvassers. Bike messengers. Musicians. Restaurant and bar employees. People who make a living off their art. People who prefer to stay in hostels when traveling. Girls that don't wear too much makeup (or none at all). Teachers. And anyone who takes at least a few minutes of each day to think beyond the trivial bullshit of their daily life as a consumer and make an effort to be the change they want to see in the world.

About posting comments: I don't mind offensive, vulgar or controversial comments, but if you post something that causes my page to expand horizontally your comment will be deleted, because I am obsessive-compulsive.

Music:

I'm a big music geek. I enjoy stuff from just about any genre out there, but my focus is on rock and roll, which I believe to be an integral part of the American character. My absolute favorite band since 1997 has been Wilco, and you don't even want to get me started on this amazing band. Or the Beatles...

Movies:

Not much of a movie buff. Usually I'd rather be doing stuff than sitting in front of the TV watching a movie. You just have to catch me in the right mood. The Big Lebowski, American Beauty, I Heart Huckabees, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, High Fidelity, Amelie, Clerks, That Thing You Do, Fight Club...

Television:

..Not interested. Turn your goddamned TV off and go do something. If it's a really good show, OK, but mute the commercials and avert your eyes. We live in an age of such prevalent advertising - on TV, on the web, on the bus, on the outside of the bus - that we're all being brainwashed into the optimum consumers. Even if you think you're too savvy to fall for ads - you're taking them in whether you want to or not, and absorbing the message into your subconscious.

Books:

..Christopher Moore. David Sedaris. Jim Knipfel. Lester Bangs. Hunter S. Thompson. Kurt Vonnegut. Tom Robbins. Stephen King (he's good, dammit). Robert Pirsig. Mainly I just love reading. I read like most people watch television. I tend to check out too many books from the library at once and either have to renew some of them or just not get around to reading 'em. Between novels I like a good short story to cleanse the palatte, or something non-fiction on a topic I want to learn about. I'm also a huge fan and subscriber of both Adbusters and National Geographic.

Heroes:

Jeff Tweedy. Abraham Lincoln. Bike messengers. Hunter S. Thompson. Glenn Kotche. Dave Grohl. Jack Kerouac. Bill Watterson. Nicholas Gurewitch (he draws the webcomic The Perry Bible Fellowship). Rene Magritte. Salvador Dali. John Muir. Indiana Jones. Holden Caulfield. Gavin Clark. Kurt Cobain...

My Blog

My incredible new job.

The plot thickens:I just landed a union job as a fundraiser for the AFL-CIO, fighting for workers’ rights, health care and other social issues I’m hardcore about. Yes, it’s a canvass...
Posted by Josh on Fri, 14 Mar 2008 02:09:00 PST

Gaining momentum.

It's exciting and not a little terrifying. This is perhaps the most pivotal moment of my life, and my current endeavor could be the most important thing I ever do. I am being carried along by a wave o...
Posted by Josh on Wed, 12 Mar 2008 01:44:00 PST

Revolting.

No bullshit: Tonight I walked out on my canvassing job, where I was a major leader in the office, a field manager, a trainer, and last week ranked number-one at fundraising in the country. I broke rec...
Posted by Josh on Sat, 08 Mar 2008 03:20:00 PST

Two truths and some total bullshit.

Two of the following items are true. Which one is false? You be the judge.* Last week I was officially the number-one highest-averaging Save the Children fundraiser in America. I have no idea if they ...
Posted by Josh on Fri, 07 Mar 2008 12:17:00 PST

Number four.

The numbers are in: last week I actually placed as the 4th-highest-fundraising canvasser in the country. I'm trying to get them to start calling me Number Four around the office, but it doesn't seem t...
Posted by Josh on Thu, 28 Feb 2008 01:52:00 PST

Open mic comedy night.

Yes, last night I actually did some stand-up comedy at Ladd's Inn. My friend Dan and I had been looking forward to this event for at least a week. We figured it would be atrocious, and that we had abs...
Posted by Josh on Mon, 25 Feb 2008 11:01:00 PST

Banana-flavored condom trumps rock, paper, but not scissors.

If you like to rock off, or ro-sham-bo.. that is, if you like to play rock-paper-scissors to settle disputes, check this out. Here's the trump card: the banana-flavored condom. The rules are simple bu...
Posted by Josh on Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:40:00 PST

If that thing touches me again, Im going to punch you.

Hey. Here you are again, reading my blog. That's creepy, isn't it? I think you should back off on that stuff.Just fuckin' with you. Okay, here's the word on the street: Kid-tested and mother-approved,...
Posted by Josh on Fri, 15 Feb 2008 11:47:00 PST

Children are the future. (Of my canvassing job.)

The Environmental Action campaign went out with a bang last night as my crew (the Sellwood Patriots) wrought havoc on the Clinton/26th area. A winning effort to get the presidential front-runners to c...
Posted by Josh on Sat, 09 Feb 2008 03:15:00 PST

The grass is greener where the dogs are shitting.

As I was reclining on my porch after breakfast on this cold morning, coffee in one hand and cigarette in the other, my neighbors to the left came out to walk their dogs. The older lady (I think her na...
Posted by Josh on Tue, 05 Feb 2008 10:10:00 PST