12/17/2020 - Snow!

Snow!!!

Yesterday it snowed... well the word “snow” is being a bit too kind. It slushed all day. It wasn’t so pretty while it was coming down (except for about 15 minutes of big fat wet flakes), but we did awake to a winter wonderland this morning!

We think even Jackson had some fun, but he may have been a wee bit too cold.

We also went to our friend JeremyWest’s acting studio Silver Line Theatre Exchange, who took a rough situation and began to build a dream from it. He led us though some acting exercises, but more importantly, we crossed swords and battled each other(!!) as part of filming his story. It was a good day.

New episode coming tomorrow, so if you haven’t subscribed to our YouTube channel, now is the time

#FKITYES

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson. @ Staunton, Virginia

12/15/2020 - Snowstorm tomorrow!

There’s a snowstorm coming tomorrow! Aaaahhhh!

And the split in the side of the camper got bigger overnight (probably because of the torrential rain yesterday)!

Obviously we had to fix it, but what do we know about fixing sides of campers? Jack shit, that’s what.

Thankfully our friend @phoebewestdraws connected us with a local woodworker named Paul who said he’d take a look, and thus we have a patch!

Thanks, Paul!

He did a *much* better job than we would have done by ourselves and he totally saved our butts.

And now we get to find out how the camper does in the snow, hahahaha

The locals tell us it normally melts fairly quickly, so we have hope it won’t be terrible to reverse down the hill.

Stay tuned, friends. It’s never boring.

#FKITYES

We love you,

Maya, Christopher, and Jackson.

12/13/2020 - Merry All the Holidays!

Have we bitten off more than we can chew, friends? Why yes, we certainly have

Will that stop us? Fuck, no!

It just means that we’ll be uploading episodes a little less frequently than we planned (until we get better at it), but they’ll be of better quality.

We’re discovering that working on the songs - which we LOVE - is taking almost as much time as editing the episode itself. Added to that, the filming that Christopher was doing in the very beginning was only supposed to be practice, but we decided to share our toils with you when the purchase of Madame P became the great saga that it has.

We’re so close to finishing this episode!

We’ll continue to share our adventure, and for our Patreon members, some added behind the scenes mischief.

We do love this bumpy road we’re on and we’re so excited you’re on it with us.

Merry All the Holidays!

December’s the best (according to Christopher)!

#FKITYES

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

12/11/2020 - Happy Hanukkah!

You didn’t think we’d skip out on #Hanukkah, did you?

It’s the Festival of Lights, after all.

As per usual, we’re deep in our work on the next episode. Still figuring out how to edit these things together!

(Christopher: HELP!!!!!)

We’re still in Staunton, VA, for a few more days and it’s still beautiful.

(Christopher: You got to go outside?!)

Here’s to learning technology by osmosis!

(Christopher: I’m sleeping in the computer now.)

Wishing you all a year full of light.

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

#fkityes

12/09/2020 - Frustrated

It’s one of those days when we’re frustrated with progress. Our upcoming episode is proving difficult to put together, even though we think we have a solid direction.

We just want it to move more and keep it interesting and it’s not cooperating dammit! 

So Jackson is trying to be encouraging, with a little help from Mickey.

“Turn Impossible to I’m Possible”

“Dare to Inspire Before you Expire”

He’s probably right.

Onwards, friends. This is all part of the journey.

#FKITYES!

We love you,

Jackson, Christopher, and Maya.

12/08/2020 - We're on the Road Again!

We're on the road again! Well... we were! Yesterday. Today we're still at our destination.

Part of the point of this trip is to get to a place and then stay for a few days. This way we can have the time to meet people, develop a conversation, and film in a way that isn't necessarily urgent.

It also gives us the opportunity to do the ever present editing work on whichever episode we're working on, plan it out, and work on the details.

When we were crossing the US on the I-80 it felt like there was never any time! And there wasn't, because we had a hard goal and needed to reach it.

But now we're getting closer to what we feel is the pace we want to go.

Right now we're in a cute little town called Staunton, VA (pronounced Stanton, for some reason ), home of American Shakespeare Center, the world's only recreation of Shakespeare indoor stage, the Blackfriars Playhouse.

It's cold here. We were greeted with snow when we drove in (which promptly melted) and it was gorgeous!

It also means we're not using the water in the camper, lol. Can't have those pipes freezing on us. Good thing the water pump is still out

On the other hand, there's a pond across the street, so...

Have you seen our latest episode yet? It's up on our YouTube channel.

More updates tomorrow.

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

#fkityes

12/07/2020 - Patreon

Friends, have you seen our Patreon page yet?

https://www.patreon.com/fkityes

For those of you who don't know (or who I haven't talked your head off about it in the past few years), Patreon is a website that allows you to support artists and creators you like directly.

There are cool perks that we'll be posting through Patreon like Ask Us Anything sessions, blooper reels, or postcards from the road.

Check it out and support us if you can. Every little bit helps us tremendously. Thank you all for sharing your stories with us, and allowing us to share our story with you!

See you on the road!!!!

#FKITYES

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

12/05/2020 - Maggie

This is Maggie, the resident cutie patootie we’ve been getting to know better for the past few days

Isn’t she the best?

We’re hanging out here until tomorrow and then it’s off to Staunton, VA, to talk to a guy about a theater project. It’s going to be epic.

Have you caught the first couple of #fkityes episodes on YouTube? What did you think?

We really want to know.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel through this link: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCansX1WOQJC8OuGKH7PCbFQ

There’s always something going on.

We love you, Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

12/03/2020 - Episode 2 and Patreon!

Big day today. Episode 2 is up and running, and we’re launching our Patreon page!

For those of you unfamiliar with the platform, Patreon is a membership based website where you can subscribe to your favorite artists and join their community.

There are different tiers of support you can choose from, and you can always decide to opt out if it’s not something you want to continue. It’s in your hands.

It's a work in progress, so bear with us!

Here's the link: https://www.patreon.com/fkityes

Every video we create is edited down from hours of footage (we know this is not news to the editors and filmmakers among you ), but we decided long ago that we can’t just make videos without music, which adds a whole lot more.

That we are the ones performing said music is the cherry on top of this scenario, and that means we also record everything ourselves and figure out new lyrics to fit into our storytelling, and on and on…

We wouldn’t have it any other way.

Your support through Patreon would mean the world to us. It would help us continue this journey we’re on to find FKITYES stories and share them, because we believe they all need to be told.

Meanwhile, enjoy episode 2, where we first meet The Paradise Inn!

Let us know what you think and share our travels with the world!

We love you!!

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

#FKITYES

Graphics via Tech Insider

Satellites via Video from Space, Credit: Dr. Marco Langbroek (sattrackcam.blogspot.com)

11/28/2020 - Madame P is fixed!

Madame P is fixed! Both internally and externally! We’re thrilled!

As many of you know, we finally got Madame P back from the shop last week after the longest stay ever to change out the rear master seal and see if that’s what was causing the oil leak (a job that should’ve taken a day or two ended up taking 3 weeks because of delays by the mechanics.)

She’s driving great, but we needed to make sure that indeed the oil wasn’t still leaking, so we put a cardboard box under the engine to catch anything that might have gotten through.

No oil leaked! She’s cured!

You may also remember just how bummed we were when we discovered the gouge in the mural. The shop did fix it, but they couldn’t recreate the mural so there was a big grey rectangle instead.

Well, we’re down in VI right now, where we met a new friend who’s a fantabulous artist - and she fixed it!!! It’s like it never happened!

We sprayed sealant on the new paint and touch-ups yesterday in anticipation of the pouring rain, and it seems like everything is holding up. Hooray!

On the other hand, there’s always something going on with the truck that we have to take care of and find a way to fix. 

On the drive down from NY we discovered that one of the latches on our storage cabinets broke somehow and we experienced some flying spices and things (not to worry, nothing broke and everything’s fine). We’ll need to figure out how to fix that before we head out in a few days.

The other thing we saw was that the base of the top of the camper that hangs over the cab is slowly splitting from the wood at the seam. This was something we were a little aware of, but it’s recently gotten bigger and we definitely needed to put some sort of a fix there because of the rain. 

Christopher packed it with Water Weld for now, until we figure out something more permanent.

And throughout all this we’ve been recording the song that goes with our next video, and Christopher is putting all of that together right now. 

Gotta tell ya, we’re both out of practice, and working on all of this is putting us through our paces!

All in all things are looking up, even if we do feel like we never catch up on all of the things that need to get done.

How are all of you holding up? Anyone excited about the holiday season?

#FKITYES!

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

11/27/2020 - Thankful

#FBF to yesterday’s feast and thankfulness.

We’ve come up against some hurdles and delays the past couple of months that kept us from getting back on the road and really start this journey, but we’ve also been shown incredible generosity and kindness along the way.

Our friends who are family, both in New York and along the way (especially the awesome friends who hosted us for nearly a *month* as Madame P was in the shop), as well as our families in California and Israel, have been so supportive and wonderful.

We couldn’t have done this without them.

Now we’re back on our way, and this is what our #thanksgivingdinner looked like, courtesy of more dear friends, including the morning after breakfast sandwich!

We’re still satiated, and beyond grateful.

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

#fkityes

11/25/2020 - A Rude Awakening

You see these faces? These are the faces of two humans and a bear who parked their beloved camper, that they’d finally just gotten back, overnight at a Walmart parking lot (this is legal), only to be woken up by a grumpy security guard and told to get going

While it’s raining cats and dogs. At 4 am. On the night before #thanksgiving

#wtf

Alas this, as many other things, is part of #fkityes.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.

Wanna know the weird part? We’re actually still having fun.

11/24/2020 - Our First Episode!

It's finally here!

The first episode of our journey, where we take you back to the beginning, when Christopher first went to Oregon to buy the camper!

If you listen closely, you can hear my first attempt at playing the ukulele...

Aaaaaand we got Madame P back today! It was frustrating and a half, but we have it and we can get back on the road!

It's a Thanksgiving Miracle!

If you haven't yet, please subscribe to our YouTube channel, and find us as @fkityes on IG, TikTok, and Twitter.

We love you,

Christopher, Maya, and Jackson (although he's not in this episode cause it was before he came into our lives.)

#fkityes

11/20/2020 - Five Steps Forward Three Steps Back

Today was... discouraging. As a result, we escaped far away from people to stare at the beauty and serenity of the Hudson River and regroup in peace.

Not only did we discover that our dear old Madame P, who we dropped off at the shop two weeks ago to repair a leak in the remanufactured engine that was installed just two months ago, was not only unfinished, but that the work has not even begun. This was coupled with a brand new revelation... a sizable gash has been ripped away from the starboard side of her cabin... the side on which the custom mural was painted.

Full disclosure, I'm pissed.

This has not diminished our resolve to continue. If anything, it had reinforced it. With struggle comes strength. Fuck it, Yes.

~Christopher.

Sometimes it feels like this journey is an intensive study into delayed gratification.

You would think we’d have our beloved Madame P back from the shop by now… but we don’t.

After hearing from the shop last week that they only have one lift big enough for us and the other truck that’s on it is having issues so our truck will be ready probably on Monday, we gave them the benefit of the doubt and called on Tuesday.

On Tuesday they told us “It’ll be ready tomorrow. Call around lunchtime.”

On Wednesday at lunchtime they said “We’re bringing it over right now. We’ll call to update you.”

We didn’t want to nag them (because that didn’t seem to help things move along faster) so we called them this morning.

This morning they said they’re still waiting for the parts to get there… 🤦‍♀️ and it’ll probably be ready on Monday (in three more days), except they still don’t know if they’ll get the parts by then… 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Thanks for that update, guys. And for telling us the truck will be ready and all 🙄

So we borrowed a car from our amazing friends and drove down there to speak to them in person. We needed a few things from the Paradise Inn anyway.

And then Christopher found that gouge that you see in that photo.

The frustration we’re feeling right now runs deep.

Thankfully this place has an auto-body shop and they said they’d fix it, but we have to figure out how to fix the mural ourselves.

Cross your fingers for them to get going so we can get our home back.

It was a gorgeous day, though, so we took Jackson down to the water for some fresh air. There are consequences to saying FKITYES. The key is having faith that it’s worth it.

We love you,
Maya, Christopher, and Jackson.
#fkityes

11/16/2020 - We're Terrible Parents!

We’re terrible parents! 😭

We spent part of the day filming ourselves and we totally forgot to have Jackson with us 🤦‍♀️

Not much to report today. We feel like we’re in limbo (still no word from the shop and still editing), but it’s nice to be in the city. We love the city.

And this is all part of the journey.
#fkityes

We love you,
Maya, Christopher, and Jackson (he forgave us).

11/15/2020 - Can we get Madame P Back, Please?

Remember when I said that they were going to finally start working on Madame P the other day? Turns out I was wrong.

Apparently the shop only has one lift big enough for our wonderful truck, and there’s been another truck they’ve been working on all week that was having issues. This means that they’ll only - hopefully - start working on Madame P tomorrow. Le sigh.

So cross your fingers for us that tomorrow by end of day we’ll get good news - that they will have fixed the oil leak and we’ll be able to get underway shortly!

We feel like we’re in a holding pattern the past few weeks. We set out from Southern California to begin the journey, then realized the ballot snafu and had to cut across the I-80 to make it to NY in time to vote, and now we’ve been waiting for Madame P to be given the seal of approval so we can get going.

We’re super lucky to have the best of friends who are helping out in the meantime while our home-on-wheels is at the shop, and we couldn’t be more grateful. But we also want to be on our way and see what we can make of ourselves.

And so does Jackson, who was enjoying the ride on Metro North into Manhattan the other day.

Technology sucks, btw. Just in case you were wondering. But we’re both learning a lot.

How has this past week been for you? Is there anything you’d like to share?
Any ‘Fuck it, Yes!’ moments, big or small?
Or maybe this time it was a ‘Fuck it, No!’ moment?

We’d love to hear about it. Let us know in the comments.

We love you,
Christopher, Maya, and Jackson.
#fkityes

P.S., Jackson still won't take off his voting sticker.

11/13/2020 - Technology? What Technology?

Some days it feels like technology is beating us over the head with a stick.

This is one of those days.

Christopher has spent the past couple of days editing and this morning discovered that a whole bunch of the work he did yesterday on Premier Pro (which he is learning to work with) was eaten by the ether gods. This means frustrations abound as we both were hoping to have the video up sooner.
But we’re also doing our best to improve our work and its quality, so we have to be patient with ourselves for now.

Not an easy thing to do!

Madame P is *still* at the doctor’s!
In fact, they hadn’t even started to work on it until today which is a further delay we weren’t expecting, but it is what it is. It’s one of the inevitabilities of saying FKITYES.

All those frustrations aside, I’m learning to play the ukelele 😱🤷‍♀️🤣
Let me know what you think after you finally see the video 😁

The picture is from sunset the other day at Sleepy Hollow.

We love you.
We promise to be less gloomy tomorrow,
Maya, Christopher, and Jackson.
#fkityes

11/10/2020 - How Are We All Doing?

How are we all doing?

We’ve been pretty up for the past few days, we have to say.

We were in Manhattan when President Elect Biden and Vice President Elect Harris were declared, and the feelings were just felt. And they keep on feeling.

We stopped at the Metropolitan Museum of Art to participate in a protest against Israel’s corrupt Prime Minister, which felt super apt, and then went into the city and experienced such joy and relief. It seemed like the city came alive, finally awakening from a four year nightmare.

We couldn’t be happier that we were here for it! To celebrate with random people on the streets in this city we call home. To celebrate with friends who are our chosen family.

It was the happiest day we’ve had in a while.

It’s cliche, but even the weather seems to agree (although that could just be global warming.)

We still don’t know what’s up with Madame P. She’s been at the doctor’s for a few days now getting her rear master seal replaced to see if it’s the cause of her persistent oil leak. We’ll probably get an update tomorrow so cross your fingers for some good news.

We’ve been filming some great #fkityes stories for future episodes and Christopher has begun The Great Edit of material from the very beginning of buying the truck, so we hope to share awesome things with you soon.

For now we’re still hanging out in NY and taking care of all those endless errands and showing Jackson around.

Have a lovely night, friends. We love you.
Christopher, Maya, and Jackson Theodore McCloud.

11/07/2020 - Happy #BidenDay!

Happy #BidenDay! We’re beyond thrilled for a #BidenHarris presidency! If people are celebrating where you are, send us your videos and photos. We’d love to share them! #fkityes!!!

11/06/2020 - We Love Talking to People About what They do Best

We’re so excited when we get to talk to people about what they do best.

We sat down with VOCE NOVA Music today to talk about life as performers pre - and during - Covid, and also some other things. #fkityes!

And Jackson learned how to record audio! We’ll have to wait a bit to see how he did. We think he’s picking it up pretty quick.

Madame P is still at the doctor’s for a bit, but we’re hopeful!

Aaaand they should call the presidential race any minute now!

We love you!
Maya, Christopher, and Jackson.