Like Hoodies and Hot Water Music

Yesterday.

I’m not from Gainsville and no I don’t listen to much punk rock. Well, I do listen to the Clash. A lot.

He was wearing a black hoodie that had “Hot Water Music” written on the front. I said, “Wow, awesome sweater! That is a great book!”

Well, turns out his hoodie was all about a band, not a Bukowski book. The good news is that he and I went way back and had had numerous run ins about Bukowski. In fact, he confided, the only thing of value he has is a signed first edition of Post Office. Well, that ain’t worth that much, but hey, you gotta start somewhere and a signed Bukowski is as good as anyplace.

I have no idea where Bukowski got the name for Hot Water Music. It seems the Gainsville band took their name from the Bukowski title. Standing on the shoulders of giants. That is good.

How does #etmooc fit into this drama? Well, as I sat here pondering the first weeks and watching the tweets fall by and took a gander at the awesome 25 definitions of Connected Learning the wondrous Ben Rimes started. I had to revisit the Treaty for All Humanity that we developed a couple years ago in the mighty #ds106.

And then along comes this tweeted link to a Harold Jarche post about PKM which is the personal side of the PLN. A line struck me as I was thinking about how these shared spaces influence my day and the second to second interaction with content:

“But sending these ideas out, and seeing how they interact with people changes us as well.”

Collaborative creation is a heady moment and when the band takes on the name of the author and the influence sits in the sounds made in some Gainsville bar, and a conversation stirs about the Buk, I am happy.

I have been involved of late with this Cybersalon thing. It is live. It is like Twitter but housed in a bar and grill. Or coffeeshop. It is a tangible in a way that the tweets flying past me now in Tweedeck are not. Different stuff.

Harold also heads a section, “Small pieces, loosely joined.”

I smile. I am bits of stuff loosely joined like a name and a book and a hoodie and #etmooc notions of collaborations and construction and the spaces that live between them.

Man, when I look back on a day of reading, I mean, back when I really read, and I think of those monsters at Harper Collins and how much I loved Black Sparrow, the nice feel of the rough covers and the perfect type. Jeez. I like the non-corporate mooc. I like the small raft of friends. I like a small press feeding a hungry audience beautiful stuff. I was so lucky to be in the #ds106 raft. I like this one too. Connected. Like hoodies and Hot Water Music and a friend from back when.