Destiny is a Flip Mino

Who hasn't at some point asked themselves or been asked "If you could have any superpower, what would it be?" The power of flight might beat the rest hands down for awesomeness and practicality, but for entertainment value I might choose token object reading, a.k.a. psychometry--the power to pick up an object and be able to sense the entire history of that object, including who owned it. Imagine the stories even the most innocuous item could tell us of where it's been and who's picked it up. My old Trek 2500 bike, for example, has logged thousands of miles on diverse American roads under my and the previous owner's journeys before being stuffed into the cargo bin of a 737 and heading overseas to Japan and touring Kyushu...then returning to American soil for duty on the streets of Oakland and Berkeley. That bike's traveled more in five years than many people I know.

I got to thinking about this all because of a little object that came into our possession Sunday: the Flip Mino digital video camera. Maia's sister, Karla, lent it to us for use in our 3-minute movie project, and she got it from eBay for $50, but its history goes much deeper than that. The previous owner seems to be a well-to-do gay businessman from Queens, New York who recently broke up with his long-term boyfriend, Scott and is paying a steep emotional price. How exactly do I know this? Well, our man forgot or just plain didn't bother to delete his recordings before hawking the thing online. Maybe it was stolen after its final recording, I don't know. Nearly an hour and a half of footage from (for the sake of easy reference, let's call him "Steve") Steve's emotional post-breakup confessions, to his Asian vacation, back to Queens for a pride parade, hotel room hijinks and finally a trip to Olive Garden where footage ends on Steve and friend eating their whole plate of pasta. Wow!

Amazing to think that this little bargain basement digital video camera has been to NYC, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Tokyo and SF. Well, we've got our grubby mitts on it now and we plan to put it to good use, thus Exhibit A: our midnight tour northbound on Shattuck...

Night Walk Down Shattuck from Matthew Lopez on Vimeo.

--Matt