So i just sent my tracks over to P-money, a hip hop producer in New Zealand we interviewed for Roadtrip Nation. I asked if the folks at his label could give it a listen and just provide some feedback and maybe some advice. I've been over analyzing a bit, thinking what if this guys just rips me, but then again all the Kiwis i met were waaaay to chill and dope to react like that, and that's more of an American industry attitude. But well see how this goes, and hopefully if they got time to give it a listen, i can get some valuable advice from em.

Here's one of the hits P-money produced in NZ called stand up for Scribe. P-money's the guy pictured in the still frame right now of the video.

clean slate,
fresh pace,
new beginnings.
different definition,
same old portrait.
refreshed illumination
encased in...
the very essence of
humble oblivion.
blended into a rush,
strokes within a brush,
personified, hanging on the cusp.
deep breaths of a
captivated wasteland.
got visions of a beautiful struggle,
but decide to chase sand.
grains slip,
from wrist to fingertip,
scent of frustration, it's linger strips
the nature of its slow drip
the faint strums of acoustic
and percussion's low hits
attention to detail facing tribulation,
but the moment belongs to the solstice
so the soul quips
in stride with the sole's hit
adjacent to the pavement
action imperative
resounding louder
than any other statement.

Around this time, I start looking back on the year i've had and take inventory on everything that's happened. I can't really look anymore at years as bad or good, cause I guess enough's happened in life for me to just say it's all comes with the territory of walking and journeying on your own personal path. Yeah, i'm one of those it all happens for a reason people, but i truly believe it, and i think accepting that opens up more of the universe and it's possibilites to me.

But i am without a doubt thankful for everything: Thankful for dad's battle, and the chance its given me to have to come home be more responsible and tie up loose ends i needed to have peace with, and the chance it gave me to really value my family, before i hit the road again. I'm endlessly thankful for Roadtrip Nation and New Zealand, the knowledge, inspiration, clarity, self belief, and power it has given me is far beyond anything I could have conceived or tried to make myself believe without that experience. I'm thankful for the different friendships/relationships that came, that went, that reconnected, and that took detours for a minute till we meet down the road again. I know that all those people are living life with a purpose and are striving for something meaningful, so i have no doubt we'll all be working together in the future again.

Everything i guess that happens whether or not we give them a connotation of positive or negative is just a small patchwork that pieces together to truly give you your identity, and show you more of yourself, and the older i get, the more i see that, and the more I can't help but be thankful for it.

I found the AP Year End World Photos, and man this are some powerful, rivetting images, and it reminds me again how much of a world is out there, beyond what we know and experience. It shows me once again, how much I can take life for granted here in the states, and how it makes me complacent to a certain point. It makes you humble, but at the same time fills me with a sense that i need to get out to the rest of the world, and have some effect on other lives out there, and wanna be able to give people the ability to have hope. Hopefully this new year and the opportunities of it, will allow me to.

Check em out here's the link, I posted a few of the 211 total images.
AP Year End World Photos

In this Sept. 16, 2008 file photo, He Pingping from Inner Mongolia, China's autonomous region, the world's smallest man sits underneath Svetlana Pankratova from Russia, the Queen of Longest Legs, as they pose at Trafalgar Square in London. (AP Photo/Sang Tan/FILE)
In this Oct. 8, 2008 file photo, an Indonesian trader reacts on the trading floor of the Indonesia Stock Exchange in Jakarta, Indonesia. (AP Photo/Achmad Ibrahim/FILE)
In this Nov. 2, 2008 file photo, Pakistani Sunni Muslims devotees return back to their homes on a packed train after attending annual religious congregation in Multan, Pakistan. (AP Photo/Khalid Tanveer/FILE)
In this Aug. 3, 2008 file photo, U.S. Army Capt. Charles Ford plays a video game with seven-year-old Wa'ad, who lost an arm and a leg to an improvised bomb, during a visit to the child's home near Muqdadiyah, about 90 kilometers (60 miles) north of Baghdad in Iraq's volatile Diyala province. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo/FILE)
In this May 31, 2008 file photo, earthquake survivor boys have a shower at a temporary bathroom in a refugee camp in Jiangyou town, southwestern Sichuan province, China . (AP Photo/Oded Balilty/FILE)
In this Nov. 13, 2008 file photo, motherless orphans and lost children rest at the Don Bosco Ngangi center in Goma, eastern Congo. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay/FILE)

In this Sept. 12, 2008 file photo, a Palestinian man crawls from a sewage pipe as he tries to avoid detection by Israeli troops on his way to the Al Aqsa Mosque during the holy fasting month of Ramadan, as he crosses from the West Bank on the outskirts of Jerusalem. (AP Photo/Dan Balilty/FILE)
In this July 24, 2008 file photo, Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., waves as he arrives at the Victory Column in Berlin. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong/FILE)
In this Nov. 6, 2008 file photo, Protegee, carrying her sibling on her back, cries as she looks for her parents through the village of Kiwanja, 90 kms north of Goma, eastern Congo. (AP Photo/Jerome Delay/FILE)
In this March 5, 2008 file photo, Pakistani women struggle as they try to order food outside of a subsidized food store on the outskirts of Rawalpindi, Pakistan. Basic food and fuel prices have soared in Pakistan over the last months, causing many to depend on government subsidies to simply get by. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti/FILE)

For those of who you who used to watch the Midnight Society trade scary stories on Nickolodeon Snick, and sprinkle their magic dust over the fire to commemorate the beginning of an epic story, i've found something for you. Here's access to all the episodes!

http://www.surfthechannel.com/show/13.html

Writing blogs, and lyrics for tracks, i get caught up in a lot of traps that make me stumble, i.e-writers block, lack of inspiration, worried about how other's will perceive it, procrastination, never finishing a piece off completely. But i found an article where Stephen King gives you 7 tips to better your writing. Check it out.

1. Get to the point.

Don’t waste your reader’s time with too much back-story, long intros or longer anecdotes about your life. Reduce the noise. Reduce the babbling. In On Writing King gets to his points quickly. Get to your point quickly too before your reader loses patience and moves on.

2. Write a draft. Then let it rest.

King recommends that you crank out a first draft and then put it in your drawer to let it rest. Now, how long you let your text rest may vary. King puts his manuscripts away for several months before rereading and start the editing process.

I often let a post rest for a day or two before I start editing (as I´m sure many other bloggers do from time to time too).

This enables you to get out of the mindset you had when you wrote the draft and get a more detached and clear perspective on the text. It then becomes easier to edit, add and cut in a sometimes kinda ruthless way. The result is most often a better text.

3. Cut down your text.

When you revisit your text it´s time to kill your darlings and remove all the superfluous words and sentences. Removing will declutter your text and often get your message through with more clarity and a bigger emotional punch.

Don´t remove too much text though or you may achieve the opposite effects instead. King got the advice to cut down his texts by 10 percent from an old rejection-letter and has followed this advice for decades. While editing my blog I´ve found that 10 percent seems to be a pretty good figure not just for mammoth-sized books.

4. Be relatable and honest.

King has an honest voice in his fiction and in his memoir. He tells it like it is and makes us relate to him and his characters. Since King´s fiction often is of an odd kind with strange plots that seldom happen to normal people I think one of his strengths as a writer is being able to write relatable content anyway.

One of the keys to doing that is to have an honest voice and honest characters with both bad and good sides to them. People we can relate to with all of their faults, passions, fears, weaknesses and good moments. King´s characters seem human. That creates a strong connection to the reader who starts caring about the characters.

Another key to being honest and relatable is keeping a conversational style. Keeping it simple and using language that isn’t unnecessarily complicated. Using the words that first come to mind.

5. Don´t care too much what others may think.

King admits to being needy about the emotional feedback he gets when he lets his wife read a new story for the first time. He gets a kick out of hearing her laugh so she cries or just cry because something in manuscript really touched her. But he has also gotten tons of mail over the years from people who confuse his sometimes nasty characters with the writer. Or just thinks he should wind up in hell. And King hasn´t always been a favourite among literary critics either.

But from what I gather he just sits down at his desk and keeps writing every morning anyway. If you listen too much to your critics you won´t get much done. Your writing will probably become worse and less fun. And criticism is often not even about you anyway.

6. Read a lot.

When you read you always pick up things. Sometimes it might be reminders about what you know you should be doing while you write. Sometimes it’s some cool idea or just the world and atmosphere the writer is painting. Sometimes it’s something totally new that makes your jaw drop. That one is my favourite. And sometimes you learn what you should avoid doing. There are almost always lessons you can learn.

If you want to be a better writer you need to read a lot to get fresh input, broaden your horizons and deepen your knowledge. And to evolve you need to mix yourself up with new influences and see what happens.

How do you find time to read more? You can cut down on other evening activities like watching TV-shows you don´t care for that much anyway. Or, as King suggests, you can bring a book to waiting rooms, treadmills or toilets. I like to plug in an audiobook while I´m on the bus or walking somewhere.

7. Write a lot.

I’ve saved the most important tip for last. To become a better writer you probably – and not so surprisingly - need to write more.

Many of the best in different fields – Bruce Springsteen, Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods - have gone beyond normal limits of practise. And so they reap extraordinary results.

But what do you do when you don´t feel like writing? Waiting for inspiration can become a long wait.

One good way to get around this is to find an effective solution to reduce procrastination. You may have to try a few before you find one that works for you. Another way is well, just to do it. And if you just get going your emotions changes a lot of the time and any initial resistance becomes fun and enthusiasm instead.

I know the boys back in Irvine, like to do a bit of the jamming, so i messed around with this arp on my keyboard and three drum beats, i just messed around for a bit in one take so forgive the amateurishness, i just switched the beats abruptly, and i mishit keys, but all good!

This is the track we recorded about a month ago, and finally done. I know, I know, I never thought i would write a track based on past relationships either, but i think after a lot of thought i see the similar paths in which most of my relationships ended, and i was able to reflect on it a bit. but here it is!


http://www.last.fm/music/Ray+Ricafort/_/Letting+Go+of+Her?autostart

I know you prob all have heard this song numerous times, but i still can't get enough of the Kid Cudi "Day 'N' Nite" Crookers Remix, and still can't help myself from not getting into it and vibin with it when it plays...OOOOHHHHWEEEEE!

First one's a little jazzy tune i tried to mess around with after reading one of phil lee's posts about jazz. Second ones a little hip hop beat with some sampled i discovered. def. wanna work more and developed these both

Man, i can't believe this, i can't describe how i feel right now, i'm just sitting here all my friends are drinking chillin laughing gettin rowdy, but me i'm content sitting right here on the couch, soaking it up, and contemplating what Pac's win means to me, but especially for the 90 million pinoys in the P.I who need that hope, that inspiration, and that faith, to keep it moving, and keep it going, because if Pacman can come from nothing and leep on grinding, then so can I. I love what it will do for my dad, an unparalleled joy and invigoration that will continue on to further make him battle even harder against cancer. I love how many critics that were holier than thou condemning this match, talking about how Pac was gonna get destroyed and only took this fight for money. But i figure they'll all be changing their tone now acting like they knew all along. Maybe Manny did do it for the money, but you can rest assured that his purse is as good as the Filipino peoples, as he's so quick to give it back to them. He did it to make history, he did it to carry a nation and lift em up, he did it to show that he is the pound for pound number one boxer in the world, all you'll hear him credit God, and his countrymen, but never himself. So thankful, words don't really describe it, Greatest Sporting Event Of My Life, but makes even better HISTORY! Congrats Pacman.

My head is about to explode, im fidgeting like a crackhead, i've never been this excited and felt so deeply about one sporting event in my life, im officially trippin son, GO PACMAN GO!!! shock the world i know it's in you, all of the P.I and all your fans around the world are praying for you!

Holy smizokes! The last episode of Pacquiao DelaHoya 24/7 was probably in my lifetime the most epic, dramatic, hype creating, get my adrenaline going, sports buildup ever! EPIC! Haha but seriously this was some good stuff, really riveting, and I love the inside look you get on the camps of both fighters, but as well as them outside of boxing, and not to mention how well produced this series is.. This will get you flowing with energy if you watch it though, I guarantee it!!!

Also, I was like, that narrator was crazy too! His voice just added this intense vibe to all the episodes. I look it up and i was pretty surprised it was Liev Schreiber, and i was like whoa that can't be his voice. So I looked him up to see if he had that old man voice type within him. I watched some videos and yeah, he's got the voice. Then I opened one video and its outtakes of a movie where Schreiber slaps the back of his movie son's head over fifty times.I thought this was hilarious, I'm wondering what the kid is thinking this whole since he starts getting slapped harder and harder, hair's flailing all over the place.

If you've got 20 minutes and want to hear a master storyteller at work, and seamlessly connect South Carolina and Hungary to each other almost if they were meant to be linked, then check out Mr. Ben Dunlap.

Now this is educational TV for kids! Biz Markie doing his beat of the day for kids' show Yo Gabba Gabba on Nickolodeon.

Wow. Dad made it to his 62nd! So thankful! Too many times over the past year and a half was prepping ourselves for the worse, or thinking about every important date in the near future that we would pray for dad to just make it to. But his faith, and his fighting spirit has gotten him here against some at times insurmountable odds, and I can't really be anything but humbled by it, and even more thankful for those around me that have constantly supported me and lifted up my spirits throughout all this time. I'm also thankful that I got this chance to show Dad and Mom that i could sacrifice just this little bit of time coming home for them, for dedicating their whole lives to me, my bro, and my sis. Happy Birthday Dad, and Thanks God, sincerely, me.

The always trusty Stumble! toolbar button from Stumbleupon.com took me to a site that showcases some crazy Digital Paintings check it!

54 Mind-blowing Digital Paintings

This is what music does for me these days...enjoy!

Fight night is almost here!
Dec. 6, history goes down!
Here's episode 3 of the 24/7 HBO Documentary Series