Virtual Rocket is about experimentation. It is about not worrying about what others think and just being creative. It is a place for me to put the things I do that have no other place. A safe haven for my idiosyncratic ideas and musings.

I am cursed with the need to constantly be creating something. That creativity can range from planting a flower bed at my house to coloring with crayons to writing and recording music in my home studio.

First, maybe some introductions are in order. My name is Paul Fresty. I am currently employed as Creative Director for a company in Cleveland, Ohio called IdeaStar. We are a web development company and typically focus on business solution sites ranging from insurance to manufacturing. We have an aggressive and fun staff and work hard at what we do always keeping our client's happiness as our number one priority. That has helped us survive the technology downturn and really separated us from competitors. Ok... enough about them.

I guess I have always been the creative type. As early as i can remember I have been driven to express myself in ways that are visual or audible. I had my first guitar, albeit a plastic one, at the ripe age of 2. Somewhere exists a photo of me with it on the toilet... very prophetic actually.

I joined a band when i was in seventh grade... that would be 12 years old for those of you who aren't willing or able to figure that out. I was a horrible guitar player. I didn't know how to tune a guitar let alone play anything coherent. So along with the rest of my mates, we started writing our own music. So that basically no one could say "HEY! that isn't how you play that!"

That band was for most of its existence called Stonehenge. There were other names and at various times other members. But for the most of 10 years straight the same four members... Johnnie, John, Bob and myself toiled in basement and garage playing our music, playing Beatles tunes when we got a little better and basically becoming brothers.

This represents the major influence on my life. My best friends, the guys in my band, have helped to form a creative energy in me that to this day still is unquenched. The four of us together are like a single unit and no matter what else we do in life, that will always be there. The music may not always be the best. The singing may waiver. The beat may sound as if someone fell down the stairs. But there are few bands I have EVER heard that can match what we have in chemistry and brotherhood. The ones I can think of you have heard of... We aren't of their caliber... maybe we could have been. But that is beside the point. We do what we do for love of it. The purest reason. And frankly, we don't care much what others have to say or think about it. Sure if they like it that is good. But we wouldn't quit if they didn't. In fact, we might just turn it up.

So somewhere around 1984 I got the bug up my butt to be a photojournalist. I was going to Cleveland State (basically so I could stay in Cleveland near my girlfriend and band). I decided to transfer to Kent State and pursue a degree in photojournalism. And I did get that degree. But I used it only slightly as during my stay at Kent I got introduced to the Apple Macintosh computer. This would have been about 1985. I was hooked and from that point on, despite completing a couple of photo internships at newspapers, I was doing graphics and design on the computer from that point.

The band at this point was nonexistent from my point of view. Those guys all kept at it with different "other players" and a variety of experimental projects and such.

I was out getting a "career".

After college I went to work for a company called Gannett at a small newspaper in Pittsburgh. Gannett is a huge media company that owns papers all over the place. I was hired as a staff artist. I did informational graphics, layouts, designs, illustrations, shot some photos to go with stories once in a while and basically started stretching my creativity.

One job led to others with the same chain as I was moved around the country and promoted by Gannett... eventually becoming Presentation Editor for a major Gannett newspaper at the time. At that point I leveraged my experience and landed a job as Graphics Editor at the Times Picayune in New Orleans. My goal to be an editor at a major metropolitan newspaper before I was 30 was realized with that job.

I supervised a staff of artists and we did some outstanding work. It was a great city to live in on many levels and the worst place in the world on others. But if you know New Orleans... you know what I mean.

While in New Orleans, I was fortunate enough to work with a small group of people who were responsible for winning the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service. Not a small feat. But alas, I have yet to follow up with the Nobel Prize despite my concerted efforts.

During this time in New Orleans I rediscovered my love for music and the guitar specifically. I played a lot and bought several guitars during that time. I was playing, writing and recording quite a bit during that time. Johnnie in fact came for a visit and we wrote and recorded some stuff together in New Orleans that we still play to this day.

After a series of life altering family deaths, I decided that being close to family was a good thing and that New Orleans was too far away for that. So I moved back to Cleveland.

Since moving back to this area, the band... the ORIGINAL FOUR MEMBERS... has reunited and put out a CD. A second CD is due anytime now as we are just completing the tracks as of this writing.

Also, I am currently working on several personal projects including a CD of my own music... a children's book called "How Jacob Saved the Moon!" and a variety of other things including some music to go with the book for children. It keeps me busy and drives those around me crazy. But that is who I am.

And if you don't like it... let me know... I will turn it up!

-paul