Vail on Christmas Eve

The agency gift this year was an awesome hd vado flip cam. I don't know if my life constitutes as "video worthy" but I'll try.

I went riding with my brother, Andrew, and his friend Cassidy. The snow was perfect, but it was freezing so we took a few hot cocoa/schnapps breaks that I'm sure endangered a few people on the mountain. After lunch we found Henry. He's a famous rescue dog at Vail; he's so famous they named a yurt after him.
It was a perfect Christmas Eve filled with fresh snow, sun and schnapps.

Volifonix

Check out my friend's band, Volifonix. They're a great group of guys from Eugene, Oregon. Wide screen version




Making of the video on the Oregon coast. It was a great night to make a music video in Yachats, OR

Weekday Warrior

Perhaps the greatest, and most obvious, perk of unemployment is the flexible schedule. When I stroll down the empty aisles of Target on a weekday morning I'm often surrounded by listless employees and mothers hauling 2.5 kids around. This makes shopping more enjoyable but it's getting to the point where I might need to borrow a baby to fit in.

Another great thing about my flexible schedule is having a lot of time for travel. Last week I went to Portland, Oregon just because. Portland has become a second home to me, I love it there. On Thursday I went to visit NORTH, a sweet agency in NW Portland. They have a mural with unicorns, a floating conference room and everyone was really cool; what more can you ask for?

On Friday we hit up the famous nau sale and watched the sandcastle building competition in Pioneer Square. We also made it to the Nike store where I picked up another sweet pair of kicks... I think it's becoming an obsession.

We finished off the day with beer tasting at Rogue, one of my favorite breweries. All in all, it was a great weekday trip and I hope I have another excuse to go back soon.

Recession, I hate you

I thought I’d have a job by now. Seriously, I did everything right. I got A’s, interned at an agency with a good reputation and graduated early. Life doesn’t usually go according to plan and I guess this is just an example of that....

Many of my friends and recent college graduates are reveling in the current economic crisis and using it as a scapegoat for their lack of employment. As someone who hates boredom and thrives on complicated situations I’m getting tired of the recession and its accompanying monotony.

People tell me how lucky I am to be free and to have all this time on my hands. Free time is great, until taking a trip to Whole Foods becomes exciting. F^@k you boredom, I want a job. I want a job that I can throw my life into, a job where I can be creative, and a job where I can produce great work. BUT... that is proving to be rather difficult right now. The first step is acceptance, so I’ve heard.

So It’s time to accept the recession. Throughout the rest of the summer I’ll let my two loyal readers know the secrets, and maybe even perks, of embracing unemployment.

For now, off to Portland for the weekend!

New Belgium in SC

I just got back from Pawley's Island South Carolina. I always love going to the South because it's a whole other world down there. I especially love some good southern cookin. We had boiled peanuts, succotash, and Palmetto cheese, a delicious twist on the traditional pimento cheese.

This year I was so excited when I walked into Food Lion and found a huge display for the commemorative South Carolina bottle of Fat Tire. The beer market in the south is dominated by the big 3 so it was necessary that New Belgium do something out of the ordinary for entering into this new area. The top of the bottle reads "Pedaling into the Palmetto State." Hopefully New Belgium can win over a few fans in South Carolina.

Across America

Lily and I just took a road trip from Charleston, South Carolina back home to Boulder, Colorado. It was a great adventure and we had a lot of fun.
Charleston is a gorgeous southern city, it was hard to leave. After leaving Charleston we drove north into North Carolina and stopped at a sketchy "Mexican" restaurant outside of Asheville, we both had grilled cheeses that cost a whopping $1.40. We spent the first night in Lexington, Kentucky; it was fairly uneventful.

Day two took us through Lexington, the bottom of Illinois, and then we stopped for lunch in St. Louis.
We continued through Missouri and stopped for the night in Lawrence, Kansas. We had dinner at a delicious restaurant downtown called ingredient and then walked through KU's campus. We ended the night at The Wheel, a bar close to campus that's been popular since my dad was at KU 40 years ago.

We got up the next morning and hurried back to Boulder in time for CU's graduation. Overall the trip was a great success; we ran into lots of characters along the way (like this guy) and had a few near death experiences...

Artificial Trees

I saw this cell phone tower on one of the peaks at Keystone. I thought it was an interesting way of trying to incorporate and disguise modern technology in the natural environment. The 'tree' looks completely fake, but at least they tried.

SXSW: anticipation

I'm sitting in DIA waiting to get on the plane for SXSW!!!! It's going to be awesome and you can expect some new posts!

Durex

Finally; a condom commercial that puts the fun back in sex rather than instilling fear. I think it's great.

PGAP Campaign

The unveiling of our Problem Gambling Awareness Project Campaign!

Valentines Day Collage

visual of my Valentines Day running around Eugene with Katie & Annie

Don't you flag me!

Ad kids thank you 'letter' to Wieden+Kennedy


Thank You Wieden+Kennedy from Kim Karalekas on Vimeo.

Notebook Notes

Hey, you graduate soon

Burger Shots

I spent a week of my life thinking about Burger Shots.. Interesting to see what the factory churned out.

BK Spain

Trouble on the set

Bcycle

The popular Paris bike share program, Velib, was canceled this week due to vandalism and expensive up-keep of the bikes. Bike share programs, such as Bcycle, are gaining popularity in the U.S. but will they fare better here?

Dave Eggers

Last year's TED Prize winner. Eggers came up with a successful plan for getting kids interested and engaged in school and his formula is being creatively replicated across the country

Trader Joe's

Trader Joe's doesn't advertise very much. Apparently they don't need to because their customers are taking care of it for them.



Credit to Carl's Fine Films

I'm a PC round 2

By adding deeper personalities to the campaign "I'm a PC" finally seems to be working.

It's true

Too Funny

A little out of season, but still painfully true and funny.

That's all Sarcasm

Best Buy, you're hilarious

"I Lego N.Y."

Abstract City Blog is an interesting and creative blog about NYC. I especially liked this post; Christoph Niemann's interpretation of New York City through his kids Legos.

Dating a Banker Anonymous

We've moved on from reality-TV being the pinnacle of american entertainment; now we have reality-blogging at its best. Dating a Banker Anonymous is an entertaining blog about the difficulties of dating a banker during the financial collapse.
"If your monthly Bergdorf’s allowance has been halved and bottle service has all but disappeared from your life.."

It goes on. These girls are serious and it's hilarious.

Skateistan

Oliver Percovich from Melbourne, Australia moved to Kabul and opened a skate park. The kids had never seen the sport before, but loved it instantly. Now he's trying to raise money for an indoor skate park/school that he's calling Skateistan. Skateistan could be the perfect diversion from the hell that surrounds these kids on a daily basis.

Knocked Up

Kings of Leon and Lykki Li vs. Rodeo Remix

In an oversized icebox

2 Burmese fishermen were found floating off the coast of Australia in an icebox. The said they'd been out there for 25 days. Really? Really?

Wordle

I'm totally into Wordle right now. I'm going to try and do one every week. Here is the latest one from my blog.

Max Sign

My all-time favorite street sign. Portland

Angry Whopper

Yesterday my friend asked me why I love Burger King. I don't like BK at all; I just love all the new microsites. They are fun, creative and effective forms of advertising. Whopper Sacrifice was a brilliant idea: you remove 10 of your facebook friends and get a free Whopper. It was so popular that facebook shutdown the application. That's powerful.

BK's Angry-Gram was a follow up microsite to Whopper Sacrifice. It's mean, clever and effective all at the same time. I love it.

Pantomonium

Pantone and Gap just opened up a pop up store at 54th and 5th. Gap sucks and is a little late because Uniqlo has already done this. But I love Pantone and I want one. If anyone is going to nyc or knows where to get them online, let me know

CPB Hero Factory

School is over-rated. This is much more interesting than professor whoever.
make yourself into a super hero!

Deep Blue

Another amazing slide show from the New York Times

44

The New York Times' 44 places you should visit. I'm going to Beirut & Reykjavik first because they were rated high in partying and culture; my two favorites.

At home in Idaho

The landscape is incorporated into the design of this house outside of Ketchum.