Elm City Dad | Elm City Mom



Music Old and New, and Tiny, Tiny Art


I had no idea albums could be a story until I listened to The Wall in high school. In the dark. In my basement room. At top volume. I'm certain my parents thought I was nutz, and I'm not sure that I wasn't during those strange teen years when I would wake up in the night and feel that my legs had gotten longer, painfully, as I slept. I came back from a week vacation once and my teachers almost didn't recognize me. When I found this site today and looked through the analysis/description of that amazing album, I was taken back to the first time I heard it, and then the first time I saw it, in college. I can still see those hammers marching, and the slicing of the nipples during the full-body shave.

Been hearing a lot about The Walkmen recently, but I don't really know their stuff. The buzz must be because their new album just came out. It's called "A Hundred Miles Off" and it was released on May 23rd. Here's a live concert of their's via NPR's All Songs Considered. They're heavy, but versatile.

And this here is just crazy. Tiny, miniscule sculptures. Like *inside* the eye of a needle tiny. Incredible.

Last bit comes from The Sky Drops. Still in the heavy, crunchy guitar realm, but these two are a bit more melodic than The Walkmen. I like'em!

All right, time to chill. The wedding planning went deep and wide tonight, but we got a lot done. I'm ready for some serious couch and Daily Show action. If it is a repeat I will mutter disgruntedly to myself.


Force x Distance = Work. Work + Love =??


The only bad part of having an amazing weekend is that it makes work that much more difficult to do. At least we've got a jump on the week. Today felt like a Monday, but I know tomorrow will have more of a Wednesday feel. The phone was an anchor today, dragging me down into the depths. I know my ability to sell suffers when I can't put energy into my pitch. They can hear the "I sure don't like working" in my voice.

In my head I was like this freaky little android, lost in a maze of bullshit. I guess I could have used some cheese. I hear it's good for everything.

There are a lot of definitions for the word 'work'. The one I like the best is the physics description: "Work is the transfer of energy." I can see my words traveling over the phone lines, exerting pressure on people to buy what I'm selling. Sometimes my words are effective in pushing that person over the purchase line. That's when it works. But if I don't have the energy for it, there's no way I'll get it done.

So how much energy do you put into what you do? Do you strive for excellence in your pursuit of fun? Do you put effort into your relationships? What does the food you eat result in? Those morsels going into your mouth are output as the accomplishments in your every day life.

I like it when I press down on the keys and words appear up here. I love it when my energies make Lu smile. (dishes done, clothes folded) And there's nothing better than hitting the ball hard up there at the softball plate. Unfortunately, tonight, we didn't work hard enough. Our force didn't put enough distance on the ball, in the right places, and so we lost.

I saw Jeffery Gitomer speak on Friday, and it was the best presentation I've ever witnessed. I went because it was part of my job, but I'm quite happy I was there to hear what he said. It all boiled down to a few key things: love what you do, have a positive attitude and never give up. The energy he expended giving his talk is going to make my work better, if I can bridge the distance between his words and my every day experiences.

But here's something strange to think about: if you put energy into whatever you do or whoever you love, somehow it stops being work, and it starts being something else. How awesome is that?


To the Woods and Water


Sunlight streaming in, but the breeze is brisk. It'll get warmer as we move north and inland toward the Russian River. Here's some old school honky tonk rock and roll from a site called ANABlog. This is a cruisin' out of town tune. There's some other good ones on the site, too. Give it a look/listen.

Hopping into a canoe tomorrow morning to float the river. There's pretty much only 2 rules with a canoe: stay centered and keep your weight low. Still, only an instant of non-thinking and we'll be in the drink. In fact, I think it might be inevitable.

There's nothing better than getting out of the city, gathering around a campfire and laughing under the stars. Summer is almost upon us so it's time to start booking some weekends out in the woods. Here is a directory for the whole US. This is the official National Parks home page. And here is the .net site which isn't as pretty, but it does get the info out efficiently.

Alright, time to pack.


Friday Bliss


Cooking dinner tonight. Filet mignon for the two gentlemen, tuna for the ladies. Fine wine. Good tunes. Tales of adventure and vacation followed by an evening stroll to our local pub.

The sun won't go down for a few hours yet, but the Friday evening has already begun.

This is why we live in this city. For nights like this, followed by a weekend in the woods and afloat in a canoe. There's even a chance this could be the weekend I catch my first fish in eighteen years. Then again, maybe not. Either which and every way, I'm pretty sure it'll be great.


Love What You Hear


Beck rocked, but he was short.

Bed is calling me. Friday is three minutes away. But we must have music. We must! I could not find the Knives Out that was covered by the Flaming Lips, but the EP is out there. (It's called Fight Test.) Instead, here's a set from the Lips from KCRW from 2002. They play that Radiohead tune, and it's great.

The Flaming Lips + Ween are coming soon, to the Greek in Berkeley! I cannot wait.

But wait, there's more! Here's a whole shitload of mp3s to listen to. I'm checking out Dracula Zombie USA right now and it's pretty fucking good. Sorta techno and bjorky with a guy sometimes singing some stuff. Then BOOM right into Desmond Dekker's Pickney Gal. This is Jamacian Rasta grooves that just soothe me smooth. Now Lost - 1950. I think this is "emo" music, but I'm just guessing.

the boy least likely to is still blowing me up. Go ahead, Hug My Grudge.

Beck rocked. I love hearing my favorite tunes inside the Fillmore in San Francisco. I know I'm lucky and I cherish it every day.


Riding Bikes


It's far too nice out to be inside, which is why it's a lucky thing I forgot my gym clothes. A bike ride through the actual outdoors is a much better choice anyway.

So let's talk about bikes. Typically the last Friday of the month is the Critical Mass ride in many cities around the globe. In some places it's a friendly bike ride. In others it is an act of protest. Here in SF, where it started in 1992, the latter is definitely the case. I have to remember to get out there for one of these very soon.

But when you're riding the streets of SF, sometimes a hill will appear that is nearly un-pedal-up-able. At least for some of us. A guy named Trevor Smith created a downloadable program that will map a safe route for you. We also have a hard copy of that type of map, which you can buy from the SF Bike Coalition, or get it when you join.

And if you're taking a bike ride through SF, one thing you could do is stop off and take a stroll through some of the hidden stairways of this city. A ride to one of them, then a jog up and down them isn't a bad way to work out on a gorgeous evening like this! There's Lu, time to ride.

PM Update: Lu's bike had a flat. We don't have a pump. Hence, bikes were not ridden, but a walk was taken. Regardless, the links above remain valid.


Stress


Everytime I think I'm getting stressed out about planning our wedding, I think how much things suck for so many other people, and I remember that this is the stress of fun, not hardship. Still, things have to get done, and not doing them when they need to be turns the fun into something lame.

But some of my friends stress themselves in other ways. The events are their choice, and they force themselves to endure it, somehow. Maybe if they shared their endurance with each other, the support and competition of the community would push them to further heights. Triatholarians, you know who you are, so check out We Endure.

There's also a stress in the musical marketplace. I want to just listen to whatever I can get my hands on. But I also want the artists to get a tick on their Roster of Goodness every time I do it. Right now the interweb is set up based on trust, and it doesn't work as smoothly as it could. We need untraceable cash on the web, yet, we also need verification and accountability for some parts of it, like voting. Until that's all sorted out, this list of legal places to buy music might help alleviate some audio purchasing pain. Sharing music is essential, but supporting the artists that create, by buying their work and giving them cash, surely does feel good, too.

Another stress to think about: that billions of humans don't even know what the internet is. They have never used a computer. Sure, that's not as important as, say, food and potable water, but computers are powerful teaching devices. Besides, the more places with people connected to the net, the better. It's a great way to yell for help when the rest of the world isn't in earshot. One Laptop Per Child is working on it.

One thing about stress that a lot of people don't realize is the way it makes you wake up and pay attention. Stress is the point of focus. Even when you don't want to, if something stresses you out, you have to deal with it or you go slowly insane. Or, at least, I try to. The ones I can do anything about, anyway. But we humans are very good at finding ways to move beyond, to forget about and to deal with the hard focus on reality we must maintain every single fucking day. That's what I'm trying to make this blog about: finding ways around the tough moments and situations of the day. I'm looking for tools to make the web easier to play with, tunes to make our friends easier to dance with, words that make it easier to understand the world around us, facts that clarify the ambiguity of reality, images that capture instants of absolute truth and fiction that is even more correct.

thrunk is the sound of time hitting our souls. thrunk is the sun sliding below the horizon, into the ocean. thrunk is finding out what you thought was true, is not. thrunk is the taste of coffee in the morning. thrunk is the bus on time to the beat of your music and the rhythm of your stride. thrunk is stress spun free, for now.


Digital Tools


A busy weekend meant I didn't have time to get my new CDs loaded up, and when I went to have iTunes rip them, it did it without grabbing any track information. And I'm not a big fan of that program anyway 'cause of the DRM (digital rights management). Instead, I was instructed by my friend Mat to grab Exact Audio Copy, which I just did. Seems like a really powerful program, which means there's lots of stuff about it I don't quite get. But I'm sure with use I'll figure it out. The songs still didn't load with Track/Artist info, which means it's the cd, not the ripper, but I'm happy to have a new program to grab music with.

Sphere is an interesting tool to grab information off the web. You add the Sphere button to your web browser, and then when you are looking at any web page, you can click on that button and find blogs talking about that topic. I like that it's a fast way to see what other regular people are saying about a particular news piece or event.

Data loss sucks. Especially photos or writing, anything you can't easily replace. Or, maybe you just need access to certain files from a whole variety of locations. Online storage is the way to go for both access and backup. Openomy gives you a gig, for free.

Also check out this powerful to-do list, and here's a tool to change your mood.


Pre-B2B Jitters


The night before fun is wonderful. There's so much to be said for the expectation of excellence. The anticipation of awesomeness. The hope of hilarity. Tonight all over San Francisco there are groups of people putting the finishing touches on their shopping carts, tying up loose ribbons, mache-ing their paper and arranging their bodypaint just so, all in preperation for the big day.

Bay to Breakers is tomorrow. The race starts at 8am, and by that time, we will be at the corner of Howard and 3rd, ready to go. So will a lot of other people. 50k in the race. Another 25k+ trailing behind them in a vast array of costumes, floats, get-ups and gear. Tiki bars will roll. Nudists will stroll. Humans dressed as salmon will swim up the stream of the madness, all the while chanting "Spawn! Spawn! Spawn Spawn!" Yeah, it's amazing. Nawlins has Mardi Gras. NYC has the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Pamplona has the running of the bulls. San Francisco has Bay to Breakers. The official instructions are rather hilarious once you see what actually goes on. Scroll on that last page to read some of the history of B2B. It was first run in 1912, and the first costumed participant was in 1940. It has only gotten crazier since.

I'm waking up at 6:30am tomorrow, and I can't wait!

Also, went to Amoeba today and put my money where my ears are. Picked up 4 albums by these artists: the boy least likely to, Gram Rabbit, Ambulance LTD, and Lyrics Born. I'm very pleased with the purchases. I could have spent so much more. New music is wonderful. Can't wait to get them on the 'pod really get in deep. After all, headphoned listening is really the only way to finesse the essence of a studio offering. Reviews will be forthcoming.

For now, thought it's port wine -> couch -> tv. Maybe SNL will even be funny tonight. Tomorrow check out mediajam. I'll be posting pix from my phonecam as we stroll, drink, laugh, hoot and holler. Ridiculousness is imminent. Debauchery awaits.


Thresholds


Words or music, words or music. It's a daily dilemma for me. Usually I just do both: read the paper and listen to my iPod. But there are other struggles, too. Paper or novel, novel or magazine, or maybe just the whole world around me, without any of those. But the cacaphony of humanity can be deafening, too. Words or music is the question I always come back to. The things that make my internal world light up.

Words. Music.

From wikipedia: "Music is conceptual time expressed in the structures of tones and silence." And "a word is a unit of language that carries meaning and consists of one or more morphemes which are linked more or less tightly together.

We can transmit whole albums, shows, entire cannons of musical work in the blink of an eye. That's not yet true for the books of our world. They remain trapped between their covers, the words pressed tight in billions and trillions and gazillions of pages.

I think when the interweb is finally uploaded with all the language and literature and history and encyclopedias, that a threshold will have been crossed. I do think we're almost there. I can't wait to see what happens then.

This screen is more than a picture, more than a page. It is a tunnel into the infinite net, and into the minds of my friends. Data is brimming over. We are joined as a species as never before. And we're all finding new ways to show ourselves and see each other.


Cool Birds, Spartan Lives


There are birds of prey in downtown SF. Gracie and George. They are peregrine falcons, and they have a wee one in their nest. Every now and then, the falcons bring a pigeon back to feed the chick. These birds live in the city of San Francisco. There's plenty of food for them. My coworker found the site. He's been watching since the nestling was an egg. I think I might have heard him coo once or twice.

They are not the only cool birds in the city. Once in the Panhandle, I saw another large bird of prey powering its wings through the eucalyptus air. It was amazing. And near Coit tower, one lunchday afternoon, that same coworker and I came across the wild parrots of Telegraph Hill. The documentary of the same name--about those birds and the man that was captivated by them--is truly remarkable. I believe it's out on DVD very soon. Pair up and watch it.

In the meantime, watch this. You are going to be blown the fuck away, just like some of the guests on that talk show. Make sure to stick around till Module 3 of the first episode. It's pretty freakin wild.


Gaahhhh!


Trying to use my wife's machine is like driving with three wheels and four gears. This computer has served us well, but the time has come for us to part ways. We were considering buying an Apple to mix it up a bit, but then her iPod crapped out. Again. In less than a year we've already had to send this thing back once, and it has never been all that reliable. I guess it's our fault for picking up a refurbished one from Apple's site. But they sold it and vouched for it, and it just flat out doesn't work the way it should.

I'm know ours is not the first recent iPod to shit the bed.

We called to see about getting help again, but Tech Support said we had to pay them to get some assistance. After the time we wasted shipping this thing back and forth, time on the phone, time spent trying to get the computer to recognized the device, the cost of the actual iPod itself... well there was no way we were paying for more help. Instead we went right to the source: Customer Relations. One phone call to that department and Apple solved our problem in less than 30 minutes. They sold us a lemon, and they were making good on it. A new, black 60 gig video iPod will be in our hands in less than 2 weeks. And it was the right thing for them to do. Now we just might go ahead and pick up that Powerbook Lu has been eyeing. But first we're going to have to throw around this new toy they're sending us to make sure it's solid and good. I see many dance parties in our future.

I can't wait to put this p.o.s. in the box and send it far away.

So links if you made it this far: lemons, laws and living the dream.

For music let's give Lab Partners a shot. And here's a Broken Social Scene video.


Pushing On Through Hear, See, Do


These are the days when this is hard. When I haven't found anything online worth posting, when I come home and nap instead of just sitting down and writing, when it's Tuesday and softball and it's 10:30pm before I hop online to make it happen. But when it is difficult it is the most imperative that I do not make excuses and get it done. It's too easy to blow off the gym. I have a thousand reasons to not go. But I love writing, so when I screw that off, it only makes me feel worse in the end. Besides, challenging moments are typically the most instructive and the most rewarding so here it goes: I've got something for ya to use, something for ya to watch, and something for ya to listen to.

For using: Google Notebook. This is still in beta, but give it a shot. I'm thinking it'll be a good place to drop links and images during the day that I can post later. I'm sure there are million other uses for it, too. I'd love to hear what you're doing with it.

For watching: It's Jerry Time! They're animated shorts with a Seinfeld-on-quaaludes wit and delivery. According to Wired "these tales of urban woe [are] a highlight of the Net vid explosion." I tend to agree. You gotta wait for it, but the kill shot is there. Made me laugh out loud when the punchline came in Episode Six.

For listening: Chad Van Gaalen. The brief write-ups/reviews say it all, and Flemish Eye seems like an interesting label. Listened to clips of the available tunes, and am downloading them now for a.m. busride listening. Always nice to have some fresh sounds to open the day.

AM Update: Chad didn't do a whole lot for me. Maybe it was the mood I was in, maybe it was the tunes, but it didn't grab me. Setting is a big part of any experience, so I'm going to give him another shot at another time, but so far, not so much.

Alright, the Daily Show has begun and the DVR has captured enough of the progam that commercials are irrelevant. It's going to be interesting to see how ad agencies cope with the fact that most of us only watch commericials at four times the normal speed. I'm sure seven second flash ads are on the way. And so am I.


Perspectives


First off I found another page that reveals the scale of a part of the Universe, namely our Solar System. The Earth looks pretty big at first, but then you see it next to the Sun, and it's a whole different ball game. That we're actually ON that speck, as even smaller bits of matter, is somewhat alarming. But, that we can even think about the enormous size of this Universe is a testament to the power of the miniscule human mind.

Just today I found out that a good friend of mine still hadn't put in his mind the book titled The Electric Cool-Aid Acid Test. That he's a Dead fan, a San Francisco fan and an avid reader makes it imperative that he read this book. If any of you fit also fit those criteria, then you too should be heading to the bookstore or clicking over to Amazon, right now. In the meantime, though, check out this site that talks about some of the events that Tom Wolfe's book deals with.

And since I'm talking about different ways to see the world, you should be sure to check out The Man in the High Castle, by Philip K. Dick. In this book, Japan and Germany won WWII, and the world as we know it is a completely different place. Incredible book and worthy of your attention.

Lastly, tunes. East Village Radio. According to Spin, this station "features a theme show for every iPod earbud in New York." Hopefully they're cool with some SFers and beyond listening, too, 'cause there's good stuff here. You can grab podcasts of each theme show from their schedule page.


Post and Run


Got little time but lots to do. Breakfast, moving a friend, then back home to get ready, then over to the Mission to hop on a bus to take us to the Presido where at 4pm, our friends will be joined in the eternal union of marriage.

So here's some new Radiohead via Mr. Horn, and if you thought you had crazy dreams last night, you should see what these people brought back from the Land of Slumber. Their dreams are famous because they took what came to them asleep, and made it real.

Gorgeous day here in SF. I can hear the breeze and see the sun, and I know that all we're going to do is have fun. Aside from the moving, that is.


Seeing it All


Okay some of you have seen a few of these but they need to be archived, so here we go:

Phish's Rift promo video. The passion is palpable and the music is kinetic. It forces you to dance. That it is naught but memories now, slices open my soul. There is a rift within, without them.

You know it is nearly Mother's Day, and I hope do something nice for her, just like these two did.

And I know you are wondering what the eff is going with the whole Net-Neutrality hullabaloo, and finally I have a good answer for you. Well not me so much as Ask A Ninja. He clears it all up quite nicely.

Since we're checking out what everyone is putting up, this article is worth a read about just how huge YouTube and MySpace have become. The former is about to become larger than CNN. That's kinda crazy, I think. We can see so much now, so much beyond ourselves, clear across the planet and a ways into the past. All of it is available at an instant's notice which almost turns it into something else entirely. We are on the verge of magic. Or destruction. But I guess that's the edge that we have always hung life on. Freezing on the savanna or burned by a stray, wild flame we'd thought we'd tamed. That's where we humans love to live. On the very cusp of time and in the hair thin slice of air between whirling rock and endless vacuum.

Air Guitar competition tonight that The Gil is in, and an airport pickup of friends. If times slices right, I can do both. Here's to hope and optimism. After all, tomorrow is Friday.


Juicy Tidbits


Ho boy. So late. Gonna chill for a minute before rolling over into the bed. I could and still want to watch the Daily Show, but I have a BNI meeting tomorrow at 7am. Work bullshit, but still worthy of attendance. They serve me breakfast, and I've found that on Thursday afternoons I'm more alert than on the days that I don't have scrambled eggs, homefries, fruit, coffee and oj. I have juicy tidbits for you tonight, though. The first is from Crooks and Liars. They're left-politics with a video slant, but every now and then they throw some music into the mix. So here we have my favorite musician of all time, performing my favorite song of all time, right next door to my favorite city of all time. Hendrix in Berkeley playing Voodoo Chile. Electric Ladyland is the album that turned me on to albums. I'd been prepped by Ritual, but Ladyland made me wake up and look around.

Next is re-hashed TV Funhouse via Mr. Horn. Saddam & Osama. The cartoon is great, but the commercials are brilliance. And because I promised Mr. Horn some MMJ (My Morning Jacket for those not in the know), here's a music blog post with some of their live stuff. Interesting other tunes there, too.

Last is flickr's blog. They are a site/service/community that continues to impress me. Google and Microsoft are about to join battle, but I have a feeling Yahoo! isn't going anywhere anytime soon. That they own flickr is a definite plus.

Winning some money tonight at poker felt good. Even better, though, was getting to hang out with my friends. My favorite part was when we all laughed and laughed and laughed.

Oh and I'm not bullshitting you, The Kleptones' 24 Hours is sick. I'm downloading "Yoshimi Battles The Hip-Hop Robots"... now.


Concept Vectors, Kleptones and Climate


Softball. Sore. Many squats behind the plate. Wedding planning is beginning to take over my life. But I am adamant that we continue to have fun even as the vortex tightens.

I'm downloading the album 24 Hours by the kelptones right now. They remix music that's out there and give it away for free. It's not quite legal, but their refusal to take any money for what they are (re?)creating greys the situation a bit.

Al Gore is back and he's hot. Fired up. Impassioned about the one cause he has never wavered from, never stopped speaking about: the current and growing climate crisis. I hear the movie about his crusade for habitation on this earth is quite good. I look forward to seeing it when it opens in early June here in SF.

And now that you've absorbed "the multidimensional concept vectors" that "span a 'web of ideas,'" go read what the hell I'm talking about. It's a short essay on applying mathematical forumals to the use of the written word.

Now, pasta and wedding planning.

AM Update: 24 Hours is sick. It's a mixed tape of remixes set to the moments of your day. So fucking cool. You've got to check this out. Download it tonight and then turn it on as you walk out your door heading for work tomorrow. It was awesome, just as I was boarding the Muni "0835 Kick the Bus, Kick the Train" came on, and we descended into the tunnels as the beats kicked in.


Leisure Life


Ah, what a weekend. So good to get out of the city with friends, spend some time in the woods, fish a bit, build a campfire and just revel in the glory of nature and its fruits. Well, not so much even the fruits as the fruits of fruit (wine), as well as barely, hops and yeast (beer). The Boonville Beer Fest was a rollicking good time. Over 70 beers on tap, and though I tried to focus on the IPAs as my basic approach, beers like Arrogant Bastard by Stone Brewery demanded sampling. Lots of people there, but only a short wait for each pour, and by 5pm, the entire place was one big happy grin. On Sunday the wineries of Anderson Valley called to us. The ones that stood out were Duxoup, Wilson and Fritz. Picked up a nice bottle of Duxoup Syrah I'm already looking forward to cracking open. Some people can save their wines for years on end. We, on the other hand, prefer our wines glistening in glasses and swirling in our mouths.

Got some books for ya today: Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood was an excellent, eerie read. She did the Handmadien's Tale which is a must, and this book is in the same vein. Near-future insanity told simply and directly without a lot of tech or hard science. She extrapolates social trends more than gadgets, and creates clear, interesting characters to inhabit the worlds. Other books that most compel me are: To Kill a Mockingbird, Gravity's Rainbow and Jitterbug Perfume.

As much as I love music, books move me more. I fell in love with creation between the pages of the Lord of the Rings and The Dragonriders of Pern in my early years. I have never looked back.


Happy My New Year!


Everyone else is always so nice on your birthday, sure. But when it comes right down to it, that day really only matters because it's yours. Like today is for me. New Year's Eve is always such a big ta-do, and I enjoy it, I truly do. I've had some of the best nights honoring that flip of the collective clock. But sometimes it doesn't work out. Sometimes New Year's can be a mess and often I've felt off from the cycle we're celebrating. A birthday is different for me.

This is my day to make my own in whatever way possible. There are certain things I've learned over the years that I like to fill it with. It doesn't always work out because life is often fickle, intrusive and annoying, but by the end of the 24 hours that mark another single cycle of this planet I've ridden around the Sun, I can usually fit most of it in.

Time for music friends food beer love laughter loudness hope. Time to finish my thirty-first spin, and start on thirty-two. Happy my new year! My resolution for myself and all of you is twofold: have more fun, and have more love.


Web Hike


Oh, boy. So much out there. It's a fucking Horn-O-Plenty filled with a plethora mixed with myriad. Do you know what the opposite of plethora is? For so long I thought plethora had no good, solid opposite that would just sum it all up like plethora does, and then I realized at some point that I knew exactly what that word is. It's dearth. And there is a dearth of good ideas in Washington, DC. Bob's got it right with this little tidbit about the price of gas these days. There's a plethora of other thoughts of his, here.

I've come to realize that the more I look, the more there is to see. It's like when you're out in the woods on a hike, for the first hour you're just sorta seeing the whole landscape, the trees in general, the sky, smelling the air, feeling the breeze of a warm summer day. But then it's two hours in and you're getting tired. Muscles are straining. You feel the small sharp spike of the first glimmerings of a blister beneath sock and boot. You feel the sliver of thirst the moment it cuts into your throat. Miniscule temperature changes force you to layer up or shed, as the case may be. And then world around you, after you've started looking for it, becomes incredibly rich with nuance and detail. Currently, on my hike through the web, I'm just past the part of tired where you don't even know which way to go and on to the adrenaline rush where it's possible that you just might not ever have to stop. So then, onward!

Jack White of the White Stripes has a new band, The Raconteurs, and they sound really really good. Edgy and heavy with a good sense of how much fun it must be to rock and fucking roll. Found more remixes, this time from It's the Rub. A little heavy on the rap/pop side for my taste, but there's a couple of gems in there. Plus, if you're looking to throw a danceparty, they would be a good source of bumpin tunes. Then, there's Slumber Party from Detroit that I found when searching for info about sleep last week, but I keep wanting to hear their tunes again, so give it a go.

Tomorrow I turn 11680 days old. Sushi and Digable Planets are on tap. Which means for my birthday I'll have several of my favorite things: good food, good music, good friends and, of course, my wife. Then this weekend brings even more favorite fun!

Time for movie + couch + dessert. Hasta yermomma.


Moving Images, Music


So let's start off with images today. Flickr you know, but sometimes it can be a little difficult to find the image you're looking for. This is the nicest way to surf that image collective that I've found. But Flickr was invented as a game. Images over IM you passed around to one another or something, and there's still something playful about the site. However, I find it's better as a place to throw up images fast and easy, as opposed to a place to deposit our entire collection. For that we use smugmug. It's $40 for the year, but supereasy to link to, and there's no snapfish/kodakgallery signin/up bullshit every time you want to check out a friend's vacation.

But images that don't move are a little passe at this point. YouTube is blowing up but there's a lot more on it and out there than just silly teenagers and stupid pets. Rocketboom's 3min tech stories gets a ton of hits daily, and has been around for a while. Blinkx.tv opens up the videoweb in a way I haven't seen before. The list goes on and on. I can't wait to find it all.

Oh and I can't resist talking about music just a little bit. Pearl Jam's new album Pearl Jam is quite good, and the All Songs Considered podcast of the boy least likely to thoroughly entertained me as I chilled at Zeitgeist, sipping a Racer 5. Check'em out; the beer, the music, the moving images. For me, though it's gametime. Softball calls.


New Tuning


So here's what I found today: KCDX. It's a radio station with a twist. There's no DJ. One guy owns it and all the music on it is from his collection. The playlist is computer generated random tunes. People are obsessed with it, of course, but The Guru really isn't interested in being known or heralded. When he and his son go on road trips, they program a playlist and have their tunes pumped out to them over the airwaves. Yeah, it's fucking cool. I was going to have you read the LATimes article about KCDX, but they hit me with registration bullshit so I figured go right to the source. But here's the article, and if login's a pain download BugMeNot Firefox extension and use it. Hat tip to Kevin Drum for tuning me to this station. Since I know you're going to want to listen and see what crazy/cool shit the servers pump out next, find out a little bit about The Tritone, the Devil's Interval, the Diabolus in Musica. I'm sure you musicians already knew about it, but it was a first for me. I know exactly the sound they are talking about, but I didn't know it was a particular thing.

This is what KDCX just gave to me while I was writing this:

  • 7:07 pm - Lynyrd Skynyrd - Truck Drivin' Man
  • 7:12 pm - Rush - Working Man
  • 7:19 pm - Procol Harum - Whiskey Train
  • 7:24 pm - Bob Dylan - Just Like A Woman
  • 7:28 pm - First Edition - Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In]
  • 7:32 pm - Kinks - Tired Of Waiting For You
Followed by at 7:34 pm - Bachman-Turner Overdrive - Lookin Out for no.1, right now. And so that's what I gotta go do. Eat dinner, talk to my wife, watch Jack on a plane, savor the Daily Show and then sleep.



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