killer app

this podcasting thing has been on my mind. I have been thinking that it is only a matter of time before someone wears a microphone for 24 hours and creates a podcast of that day as some sort of modernist art statement. any volunteers?

crapcasting

I've been pretty busy lately- mostly getting my ducks in a row for my pending move / complete life overhaul that will take place in mere weeks (7? less???)- but I've still found some time to do some really really dorky stuff with my iPod.

Apple has decided to make a big deal about podcasting, which they describe as both TiVo and Wayne's World for radio. It's basically blogging but in audio format, and the big appeal is that you can sync, say, your iPod (yes, hence the 'pod'-casting) every morning with your computer and have it download the latest broadcasts from whatever you subscribe to. And since I'm such an Apple fanboy / information junkie, I took the bait and downloaded iTunes 4.9 (now with Podcast support!) and, before I left for work this morning, decided to 'subscribe' to a few podcasts.

Of course I've known about podcasts for a while. What kind of dork do you think I am? Dave even showed me that you can make drunken phone calls to your blog for the world to hear. But I really haven't been very interested in hearing, say, some other dork reading to me what I've already read on his website. Call me old-fashioned. But once Apple decided to put their seal of approval on the whole phenomenon, I obviously had to try it out. I tried to subscribe to 5 or so podcasts, including the one that supposedly started it all that Adam Curry (remember him?) does daily, but only 3 made it to my iPod. So I drop Winnie off at the T, thinking she'd be too ashamed to participate in something so horribly dorky with me first thing in the morning, and head to the new 'podcasts' option on my iPod while merging onto 93 at 80mph.

First up: the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy podcast. It starts off with Carson (the flamingest of them all) telling me that if I have any holiday-themed clothing, I should roll it up in a ball and throw it out. Each of the Fab 5 has an equally insightful 10-to-15 second blurb over a background of that techno beat they use throughout the show. One of them told me to brush and floss my teeth. The food one (who's my favorite) said that you should cook for a date because even if you fail, it's cute. Okay, just what I expected... this is pretty dumb. If I want music, I'll turn to the other 39.9 gigs of space on my ipod for entertainment; if I want insight, I'll listen to NPR.

Anyhow, I kept at it. Next up was the iTunes New Music Tuesdays report. It's basically a run-down of the more important new releases of the week with a healthy dose of Apple propaganda thrown in. Ya know, now this could be interesting. While I wasn't really interested in the "Dance Hollaback Girl" remix, this sort of thing could be pretty cool on the local music scene scale of things. Maybe I'll send some mail to New England Product... or maybe that'll be my excuse to start podcasting. Or, most likely, I'll do neither.

The third 'cast that ended up on my iPod was KCRW's "Le Show", which is apparently a weekly show on KCRW Los Angeles hosted by Harry Shearer. Immediately upon hearing his distinctive baritone voice I remember that he's the guy that does Smithers' and Principal Skinner's voices. Okay, I'll give this show a shot. It turns out to be basically him killing 45 minutes of time by reading headlines... very...... slowly....... with the occasional improvised quip thrown in for good measure. Still, there's a reason this guy doesn't host The Daily Show.

So I don't know. I'm sure someone will find the killer market for the podcast. There are a few shows on the radio that maybe I'd like to time-shift and listen to at my own convenience, like New England Product mentioned above or One In Ten, which I usually listen to on my ride home from band practice on Sunday nights. Maybe if the Food Network did a podcast I'd be into it. Or maybe if they got Spongebob or Peter Griffin to read the news. Now that's quality radi... er... podcast!

And yes, I see the irony / recursiveness in blogging about podcasting, which is basically blogging. But I've done that before.

Ooh... come to think of it... I'll podcast Focusin's next show. Damn, I'm good. That'll get you to buy our CD!

but if you lose, philip morris gets your soul

I did something the other week that I am not too proud of. In fact, I'm a little worried about it.

See, I was at Asian night at 180 for... I don't know why, it was Winnie's idea... and I was minding my business, drinking something foofy and expensive, when a semi-attractice blonde girl with a bare midriff approached me. She was carrying this neat tablet pc-looking-thing and asked me if I was a smoker. Now, I had seen this ruse before at other bars and politely declined, but there must have been something in the air (gin, tonic, and hot Asian chicks grinding on the bar will do that to me) because I decided that I would go for the free Zippo lighter and say that I was, indeed, a smoker.

Before I knew it, I handed the girl my Mass driver's license-- I think the logic that went through my head was that I would be severing all ties to Massachusetts in mere months, so this couldn't bite me in my shiny, metal ass forever-- and within seconds a scanned copy of the license appeared on her nifty identity sucking device. I may have had to sign something confirming that I was a smoker and then she handed me my free Zippo lighter in Marlboro promotional packaging.

I woke up the next morning with an Advil-curable hangover and in a bit of a panic about what would happen to my driver's license and, more importantly, my identity, now that Philip Morris had it in their tar-and-emphysema-covered hands. I thought that a Zippo (it was an honest to goodness Zippo, as far as I could tell) was a pretty big thing to be giving out for free- there must be some strings attached. My friend Beth didn't help when she was explaining her theory at a party the following night. She postulated that the tobacco companies were in cahoots with insurance companies, and from now on I will be known to Met Life as Adult Male, Smoker. That would suck.

Personally, I prefer the theory on this website:

http://www.unfilteredtv.com/learn/one_news_article.php?id=8

Since cigarette companies get in trouble for unabashedly marketing themselves to children and the like, they've had to seek out other venues in which they can convince the populace to buy their death sticks. And what better arena for promoting their wares than at bars, which are full of people who are guaranteed to be of-age (or to have really good fake IDs, so buying cigs wouldn't be a problem for them) and are drinking anyway?

So I don't know. It's been a week and I haven't heard a word from my new friends in Big Tobacco, and I haven't noticed any suspicious activity on my credit cards nor spikes in my insurance rates. If the link above is correct, maybe I'll start getting some tobacco promotion in the mail at some point... but since I'm moving in a month, that may just go away.

Damnit! Now I want a beer.

PSA

Yuri sent me the best public service announcement ever:

http://www.rachelgetsfruity.com/flash.html

...sucka what?

This is a story about how hard work pays off.

A while back, Focusin was offered a gig- I think it was at Harper's Ferry- and Glen got his coworker's newly formed band, Sucka Brown, on the lineup. Glen described it as a favor... it was a pretty decent club for a band that was just starting up, and their act wasn't really much to write home about. They were great guys, and their rhythm section was really tight- I think the guitarist, bassist, and drummer are/were Berklee kids. But their songs all sorta sounded the same and their singer had a tough time staying on-key. It all sorta sounded like an Incubus ripoff to me.

I forget if that was the only gig we played with them, but we kept in touch. They would come to our shows and we showed up at theirs. Glen would every so often tell us what he'd talk about with their lead singer at work... apparently they practice 4 times a week (we practice two if we're lucky, but that's another story entirely), they brought in some pros to help promote their music to radio stations and venues around the country, and they work their asses off promoting each of their shows. I think they even leased a van as a band for the heavy gigging they were doing.

The more you play, the better you get. There's no way around it. Through practicing and gigging together, you develop almost a sixth sense of communication with your bandmembers. All the parts of songs start to gel. Endings get tighter. Playing as a band becomes second nature and you can spend your time on stage having fun playing rather than worrying about the chord changes or if your drummer will remember the bridge. Well, Sucka Brown is getting their money's worth out of the van. While many 'local' bands will have maybe a couple of gigs in a month, the Suckas play maybe 3-4 a WEEK. And they're tapping into some very vital markets for aspiring bands- i.e. colleges and prep schools full of kids who are eager to part with their parents' money for an up-and-coming local band's t-shirt or CD. And it doesn't hurt that they're all tall and skinny.

At some point last winter I was talking with their guitarist, Todd. He told me they had been doing preproduction on their album at Q Division studios for a while, and the stuff was sounding great. Q Division is (as far as I know) one of the best and most important studios in the Boston area... I know Aimee Mann, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, The Pixies, and many others have been through there. I also hear it costs a pretty penny, too. So Sucka Brown somehow raised money to embark on a project that Glen and I have guessed costs in the realm of tens of thousands of dollars. I know their singer makes a decent living, and their guitarist works at Starbucks... but getting tens of thousands of dollars together between four guys is a serious investment. For reference, Focusin spent maaaaybe $2,000 on our album (maybe I'll tell you about the recording process in a later post), and 98% of that money came from me and Glen.

Last night Sucka Brown played the Middle East Downstairs. Yeah, Focusin's been there, but lately we've had more luck with the smaller and slightly less prestigious upstairs room simply because we never drew the numbers of people that they expect downstairs. I got a text message from Yuri as I was leaving my music theory class to head into Cambridge: "Looks like a promising show." I get in line (there was a line!) amidst a bunch of 17 / 18 year-old-looking kids fumbling for their fake IDs. Damn. Focusin has spent nearly four years playing for our friends, who in the most part are 25-30 year-olds. It takes quite a bit of cajoling to pull many of them away from their typical weeknights in suburbia, especially since more and more of them are 'growing up'- i.e. getting married, having kids, and other things that lead to not wanting to try to find parking in the middle of Cambridge on a weeknight to catch your buddy's 11-11:45pm set, especially when you have to be at work at 8 in the morning. But seeing those sweet sweet high schoolers lining up for the Suckas made me realize what idiots we were in promoting ourselves. High schoolers haven't got a care in the world! No wives, no kids, no lame desk jobs to get to in the morning-- all you worry about is looking cool and having a blast with your friends. And, as I mentioned before, what could be cooler than latching on to a band that you can bum a cigarette from after their set? We've been going about this all wrong.

So the Middle East was packed. Easily double (and probably more) what we ever brought playing down there. Paranoid Social Club opened- they've been sharing a bunch of gigs with Sucka Brown. If you don't know, PSC was formed from the ashes of the Rustic Overtones, a band whose name I've seen bring tears to Mainers' eyes. PSC put on a phenomenal set and they're releasing a CD on August 23 which I am planning on picking up. Plus Sucka Brown's guitarist told me PSC recently signed a record deal. Rock on.

So anyhow, the Suckas have been playing their cards right. They've been playing the right gigs, and doing all they can to promote them to the right crowds. From what I saw last night, all that hard work paid off. All the production work they did at Q Division really helped hone their songs from somewhat boring white-boy funk into 3 minute catchy pop ditties. I definitely noticed the change even in their older material. It is so easy as a band to write songs that are fun to play or are technically challenging but to completely forget about making them interesting. This is why producers exist, and that's yet another skill I look forward to honing at school in the fall. This is why Bridge (song 1) on our album is one of my favorites... because we took the time to make it a tight pop song rather than a self-gratifying wankfest (not to say that our other songs are wankfests, but there is a definite distinction in production between that song and the others...). Plus recording your songs is guaranteed to make you tighter than ever when you perform them, and that definitely showed in the Suckas' performance. And Brendan has definitely been working on his singing... he is leagues more confident and capable with his vocals than he was even a few months ago.

Unfortunately since I'm leaving in mere weeks (eeek) I don't think Focusin can have our third or fourth renaissance and realign our goals and form proactive strategolutions to shift to a more effective paradigm of marketing. Plus... I'm not that tall. I suppose I could go to China for some black market leg lengthening surgery (um... owch?), and I suppose I could start hitting the gym to work on the skinnyfication part (um... maybe tomorrow), but I think I'd be perfectly happy becoming one of those guys behind the scenes- like, say, Rik Rueben- whose art is to help others hone their lumps of clay into beautiful sonic sculptures. Especially if the bands are willing to share their groupies.


BTW, Sucka Brown finished up mixing their CD last night after the show. It's supposed to be coming out in late July-- keep an eye out for it! And it sounds like my other favorite local band, Raymond, is almost done with theirs, too...

jobasaurus

Yesterday a nice woman who sits near me announced she had to leave the company for family / personal reasons. It's too bad when someone nice / fun / bubbly / chipper / female like her leaves, because they're the kind of people that make office life slightly less unbearable. Everyone that she told-- from peons like myself to even upper level management-- reacted with the requisite sadness and, more importantly, everyone let her know that they were jealous in their own way. Some said 'take me with you' in a mock-joking fashion, while others blatantly said things to the effect of 'I wish I could do that.' Hearing others' reactions to her announcement made me even more confident in my decision to drop everything and try to realign my life into doing something that I could potentially wake up every morning and want to do.

I managed to keep my head from collapsing on the boardroom table during a completely mind-numbing two hour meeting yesterday by trying to pay attention to what everyone was talking about and thinking about just how ingrained corporate inefficiencies are in our minds around here. It seems that priority #1 for managers (at least around here) is to get their paperwork done correctly and to make sure their teams do all their paperwork correctly too so they don't get shat upon by the next rung up in the ladder. But the shit they were talking about in the meeting yesterday... man, was it dumb. Call me sexist, but I almost felt emasculated listening to grown men with degrees in engineering (and with higher-ranking engineering roles than me) making a big deal about 'concatenating files' (read: copying and pasting text) and 'SLOCing files' (running a tool that takes 10 seconds to count lines of code so our managers can be happy with our 'productivity rates' (how many lines of code we've written, which is really a complete bullshit measurement of productivity, but that's neither here nor there (if you want to read a good article about what a pile of crap SLOC productivity is, read this article about Bill Hertzfeld's work on the original Macintosh))). To all my friends that think a degree in computer science or a career in computer programming directly correlates to computer savviness, you would be surprised at how often that is an exception rather than the rule. I then amused myself by coming up with quick computer program ideas that would do all the work these girlie men were bitching about and the manager was perparing to allocate many 'man-months' to accomplish.

How would it feel to be replaced by a shell script?

Come talk to me sometime, sweetheart... I know what it takes to be cool

One reason why The Family Guy is the greatest cartoon of the internet era is all those random references that they intentionally put in that maybe 5% of their viewers will 'get'. A good portion of the other 95% of the people that don't immediately 'get it' will at least recognize that the references are references and can turn to the internet and figure out where the reference came from.

Google "stewie william shatner" and you get a link to this page on milkandcookies.com that has Stewie's "Rocketman" performance... and the incredibly odd but awesomely parodiable William Shatner performance that it's based upon. Brilliant.

hari hari

It's no secret that I'm a big Apple dork. Just look at the links at the side of this blog. Or come over and check out my collection of Macs and iPods in Malden. Or that "Think Different" poster in my cubicle with Lucille Ball and Ricky Ricardo (Ted, if you still have that Jim Henson poster I gave you, you bastard-- Mac-freaks will pay you good money for that!). In fact, I'm probably the biggest Apple dork I know- if you know someone like me (especially if she's hot and single), put 'er in touch; there are support groups for freaks like us. I was going to write a long post last Monday about how I nearly had a heart attack when Apple announced their pending switch to Intel... but after going through the 5 Stages of Acceptance, I've realized that there is simply too much to write about the whole issue and instead I'll direct any interested parties (you still there?) to the following few articles:

Cringley thinks Apple + Intel are trying to dethrone Microsoft
Great article #1 from Ars Technica (great nerdy speculation on what's to come)
Great article #2 from Ars Technica (explaining what a mindfuck this is to the general Machead psyche)

Apple plays a large role in why I got into computers / computer science in the first place, and I even have the thought in the not-so-deep recesses of my delicious brain that a great place to work after I get my master's in music technology would be... yep... Apple. You've heard of GarageBand? Or the iPod?

My friend Jon just asked me if Steve Jobs is my idol. I don't know. I have a tough time referring to anyone (human or otherwise) as an 'idol'-- maybe all the teachings in Hebrew school of not worshipping false idols really got to me-- and I don't want to exactly repeat what Steve's done because it's already been done... but to be the head of the greatest animation company in the world and the greatest computer company in the world and to be commonly referred to as a 'rock star' of CEOs... yeah, that'd be pretty sweet. He gave the commencement speech at Stanford last week and here's a transcript... it's a great read for insight into what an interesting and accomplished man he is (but my mom won't let me show this article to my youngest brother- he's going to Reed in the fall and she doesn't want him to get any ideas...)

http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html

fried twinkies for my comrades

I dreamt last night that my family was at a town-fair-like activity and my dad went into a tent and emerged a communist. My mom was really pissed off at him because she thought the government would ferret them out and search our house and find all our drugs.

Am I OK?

when i look back at all the crap i learned in high school

since I've told a few of my high school chums (hi, chums!) about this site, I thought this might be of interest... and even if you didn't go to high school w/ me, check out what a great place it's becoming!

From the May 4 parents' association meeting:

In the aftermath of the Greece trip, students have been spoken to regarding Hackley’s policies. The objective is always one of deterrence. Walter’s hope is to create a safer environment for all students. He also discussed the conditions under which Hackley may require look into drug testing, as decribed in the Student Handbook. Random testing will not be employed, but if there are credible allegations of drug use, Hackley reserves the right to use non-invasive drug testing by hair sample. He noted that sometimes students may act as if they use drugs just to attract attention. The hair testing system, which requires only 1.5 inches of hair and tests drug use in the past three months, can be employed to test for a variety of substances, although not alcohol. Rules regarding severity of punishments and offenses are found on the website in order of their severity., although none are absolute. As a result of the Greece trip, there will be an increase in the rationumber of chaperones on school trips, and chaperones will be instructed on increasing their effectiveness. He intends to talk more to students, faculty and parents in the future to explain the protocols, possibly including a signedwritten agreement to signfor students participating in overnight trips and for their parents.

(yes, all the typos are from the website, too... i was too lazy to go in and enumerate the [sic]s...)

Does the word 'draconian' pop into any of your minds also?

Some background:

• Yes, I went to a snooty private school in Westchester, NY. For what it's worth, I had a great time, made some lifelong friends, and learned a lot.
  
• Walter = the headmaster.
• "The Greece Trip" that is referred to in the above snippet happened last year. On the trip, a faculty member apparently let some kids drink booze. Somehow word got back to the mothership and all hell broke loose. The funny / ironic part is that neither I nor thousands of other alumnae would have heard about it if the head of the alumni and development office hadn't sent out an email explaining the whole situation and how Hackley 'did the right thing' by severely disciplining the faculty member and students in question. Jerks.

I've heard of schools in less-than-savory areas installing metal detectors, but as far as I know, public schools can't get away with randomly drug testing 'suspicious' kids. Come on, man. As if most of our high school years aren't spent being horribly awkward-- I'm sure I would have been on whatever 'watch list' the administration drafted up just because i had was a really skinny kid with a big ol' afro. Plus one of my best friends was kicked out of school for allegedly selling some pot to another kid in our school's candy store-- I honestly don't know whether it actually happened, but the kid that got caught with the weed's testimony against my friend was more than enough for the administration to kick out my good friend. A bunch of friends of the accused went to Walter and pleaded for our friend- who knows, if the policies mentioned above were in place then, we probably would all have walked out of walter's office with 1.5 inches of hair missing.

It's too bad. When I went there, it was a great place where you could meet some really interesting people, both kids and faculty, and be overprepared for college in the process. Now they're lucky to hold on to a teacher for more than two years. I have three words of advice for my Hackley brethren:

Shave your heads.

choose your barrels wisely

I work on a project with a very nice middle aged single mother who makes up what she lacks in contemporary computing knowledge by posessing decent interpersonal skills, which is something most computer engineers (at least around here) don't have. Recently I was recruited for a project that she's working on with 'finance people' to help get their numbers in order. When I got the gist of the task we had, I realized it boiled down to simple algebra and getting data from computers. It comes down to, at least as far as I can tell, a bunch of people with a horribly disorganized computer infrastructure doing weeks of work by hand to accomplish something that would take mere seconds of a computer's time.

Their computer problems run deep- they have systems that have probably been in use since I was in diapers (you know, like, two years ago)- and I am only working with them part time so I really can't solve everything for them. However, being the most computer-savvy of the bunch, I have been able to do what I think of as very simple, even menial, things that have blown them away. They are so impressed with my 'computer wizardry' that I was told at my last meeting that my name comes up frequently in their meetings and that they want to erect a statue in my honor over there. They also alluded to trying to poach me from my current project and double my salary, which would certainly make me re-think this whole school thing (hey, man, everyone has a price).

My point? Sometimes it's good to keep some well-stocked barrels of fish and a fully loaded automatic weapon in your life. It's good for the ego and can even help out your wallet a bit.

MTDs

I saw De Sol and Ozomatli at the Paradise last night with my brother. Incredible show. It had the energy of all those ska shows I used to go to with an amazing undercurrent of musicianship and sabor that I haven't felt since my days as a roadie for Los Lobos. Awesome. Random observations:

• At one point the singer and bassist from De Sol got together to share the same mic at one point in a song. You know, the ol' Steven Tyler / Joe Perry thing. Mark has done that a few times at Focusin shows and... I don't know, man, call me homophobic or whatever but I just feel awkward doing that. The toxic twins could pull it off well, but the De Sol guys looked like they were about to make out. But...
• You can get away with a lot of stuff that would really be corny / dumb / cheesy... if you do it with international flair. Like De Sol- at one point they did this very cool a capella thing where they all sang some rousing Spanish chorus with one nylon string guitar as accompaniment, and then each one would take his turn rapping or singing alone. The ones that sang in Spanish sounded really cool... they sang things about Mexico and I think one of them said his grandparents liked to smoke big joints. And then the token gringo got up to the mic and rapped in English something to the effect of "I have ancestry from Mexico to Germany / I live a park called Asbury / ...". It was decidedly not as cool as what everyone else was doing. But I ain't complaining-- these guys were great.
• De Sol closed with an old Tito Puente song, Oye Como Va... performed exactly as Carlos Santana did it. A spot-on rendition that got the crowd to go nuts, but my brother and I both turned to each other and said 'is this the equivalent of an English-speaking American band closing with Sweet Home Alabama?'
• Ozomatli is one of the coolest live acts out there. 10 dudes (!), rotating instruments... guitar, bass, drums, keyboards, dj, a few rappers, lots of various latin percussion doohickeys, and a HORN SECTION. And at the end of their set they marched off the stage and formed a drum circle in the middle of the crowd. They're playing Brooklyn and NYC soon, among other places. Get thee to an Ozo show!
• Ozo was, however, loud as all hell. It was so loud that they had a lot of feedback problems, which really doesn't help one's already ringing ears.

"Uh, hey, Bennett... there are these things called earplugs..."

Yeah.. uh... I'm aware of that. But... I dunno, man... earplugs are like condoms for your ears... man. Sure, they keep you safe and all and protect your extremeties from various maladies like chlamidya and hearing loss... but you just don't get the full experience wearing 'em, ya know? I guess they have some more tolerable varieties... the lighter ones that don't just filter out all sensation... I've worn 'em in my time, and after last night I probably should get back to wearing them. I woke up this morning (I know there's a morning after innuendo to be made here) and had a little bit of a panic attack when I got in the shower... my ears were still ringing from the night before (I know, I know... BAD!) and the running water just didn't sound the same... as if some of the higher pitches just weren't there. Eek. One thing I pride myself on and one of my major justifications for going to music-ish school in the fall is my hearing... I'm always the one that gets irritated by a monitor in the next room because I can hear the high pitch whine a CRT gives off from pretty far away. How can I become a sound engineer if I can't hear part of the audio spectrum? My mixes will sound like mud! Sure, maybe Monet could pull off painting even in his older years when his eyesight deteriorated... but a) I'm no Monet and 2) I don't have years of experience with mixing / recording so I probably can't fudge things like EQ quite yet. I conducted makeshift hearing tests in the shower- cup my ears and see how that affects the sound of the running water, snap my fingers in various places around my head to see if I still heard everything properly, but all I did was second-guess myself- that's not supposed to sound like that!- and get more worried.

I think I'm alright now. Will I learn? Will I remember the headache and ear ringing and panic attack that ensued, or will I ride the Valhalla Kittens tonight and Raymond tomorrow and band practice on Sunday bareback as always?

Good thing I took those two semesters of American Sign Language in college.

mr. reliable

I've developed a reputation over the years as being a fairly unreliable person. That's not a very appealing trait, i know... but I've also realized that I haven't been doing much to dispel this image, either.

Case in point: last weekend.

Friday Night
Plan: Go into Cambridge and catch at least one of my guitar teacher's shows, one at TT's at 9pm and one at The Lizard Lounge at midnight.
What I really did: Went home to Malden and lost all will to do anything. Drank vodka tonic and watched The Empire Strikes Back.
Excuse: Malden will suck all the life out of anyone. It's a black hole for the soul.

Saturday
Morning Plan: Sneak in brunch w/ an ex while Winnie was off at her Korean lesson.
What I really did: Walked around Allston rock city. Got a haircut and a delicious egg sandwich at Herrell's.
Excuse: I was supposed to pick up my car while Winnie was heading to her Korean lesson but the garage couldn't find my keys, so I had to come back after Winnie's Korean lesson to get the car. BTW, it turns out the tensioner for my car's serpentine belt broke, causing the serpentine belt to come loose and wreak the havoc that it... uh... wreaked. $400.

Afternoon / Evening Plan: Go to Anna's housewarming, see Keane, catch Fooled By April's last show ever at the Paradise
What I really did: After picking up my car, I ended up playing some tennis. I wanted to head to Anna's (the housewarming, not the taqueria) but by that time I wouldn't have been able to make it to Keane at the FleetBoston Pavilion (an awesome venue, btw). Post-Keane I was very tempted to see fxa's last show (according to Joe and Brendan, it was an amazing time...) but I had nobody to go with me, so I ended up going to the Cactus Club and having people feed me margaritas. That wasn't too bad.
Excuse: Well, I did reply to Anna's evite with a 'maybe', and Glen justified missing the show by saying 'well have they ever come to one of our shows?'. I still would have liked to go to both (sorry, Anna!). Oh well.

Sunday
Plan: See Porsches On The Autobahn at night at the Enormous Room with Andrew.
What I really did: Got dim sum at some tasty place in Chinatown with some friends. Winnie then went off to hang w/ her Korean teacher, and Shayan and I walked from Chinatown to Newbury St and had a nice homoerotic shopping session. Got a call from Goss... barbeque? Sweet. So I walked from Newbury St to Brookline. Had beers, grilled stuff. Watched the Simpsons (new episode was awesome) and Family Guy (very awesome). Now it's 9:30pm and Porsches was supposed to start anywhere between 9 and 10. The T would take me maybe an hour to get from Brookline -> Central (yet another reason why I can't wait to be in NYC- a subway system that actually works). I forgot that when you don't have your car handy in Boston, it takes time to get places. Shit. Call Andrew to cancel, feel like complete dick. Walk to bubble tea place and kill time until I'm retrieved by girlfriend.
Excuse: No excuse. I screwed up. Andrew said Porsches were awesome (duh).


On one of my trips back to NYC, one of my best friends labeled me as 'The Overextender'... it was probably one of the many times I made plans with 30 people and thought I could somehow pull it off, a-la Mrs. Doubtfire. You'd think I would have learned to have the social planning skills of a 12-year-old by now. But then you'd be wrong.

cliched media rant #81726

they have TVs in our cafeteria that lately have been tuned to CNN. today CNN kept showing clips of that 'slaughter of bosnian muslims' video that they found. they didn't show the actual killings, but the showed people on their death march and i think they then cut to them lying dead in a ditch. just like that time they were showing clips from one of those beheading videos and cut away just as zarqawi pulls the machete out of his pants.

i think i would have a much easier time explaining what a nipple is to kids than why the hooded man is carrying a gun or a machete and what's going to happen to the man in the orange suit. thank you, FCC, for making parents' lives so much easier!

Fuck! Shit! Cock! Ass! Shitty boner bitch! Muff! Pussy! Cock! Butthole! Barbara Streisand!

cup = 1/2 {full | empty} ?

on one hand, my car died when i was in the safe environment of my company's parking lot and driving only 10 mph. if i was on the highway and the main belt in my car that is responsible for my power steering, alternator, water pump, and other semi-vital car-organs went out like it did an hour ago, i might be in much worse shape.

on the other hand, my car's super-important belt (as far as I can tell, it was like my car's aorta) just fell off its track and i have no idea what the hell it's gonna cost me to fix it. reason #24357 why i can't wait to get to NY- to not have to worry about cars anymore. i actually had money saved up before i decided to step up from my used volvo to my used audi. the car has been the bane of my existence ever since.

so I ask you, dear readers: what's the best way to dispose of my car in a manner that will pay off the remaining $3k I still owe on it as well as the handful of $k that I indirectly blame my car for wreaking on my credit cards? mind you I will be a broke-ass student in a few months.

discuss.

if I put it on the internet, it has to be true

I had two minor epiphanies in the past 24 hours:

1) There is this greek yogurt that's available at Trader Joe's called "Fage"- I'll give it the benefit of the doubt and pronounce it as 'phage' and not 'fag-e'- and it's the greatest thing ever. Even the 0% one. Especially with apricot preserves stirred in.

2) I am really good at thinking of lots of ideas and even doing some of them... but completing them is another matter. In fact, you could go so far as to say I never really finish anything. I've sort of known this all along, but it took someone I work with telling it to me to sorta get me to, you know, really know it. Apparently I've developed a reputation around here as a whiz kid but I need to be 'sat upon' (her words-- eew) to get something done. And... yeah, it's pretty true with everything I do.

As I said, I have been aware of this for a while. A college roommate who I would often jam with would always get pissed about the fact that I know basically every song ever recorded... halfway through. So he'd be all psyched to pull out some random song that I could play along with, and then understandably get miffed when we got to the bridge and I couldn't fudge my way through it. This, again, is due to the fact that I never really finish things-- as far as guitar goes, I'll usually just learn the main riff and chorus for songs, and consider my job done.

With some things in life it may be a self-defense mechanism... I can get things almost done, prove to myself that I can do it, and then write off any of the flaws to the project's incompleteness. That way I never do anything that isn't perfect!

I'm trying to break this get-it-90%-done-then-leave-it habit by actually following through on things. I'm learning a bunch of cover songs w/ my friend Jon so we can be armed with some Police and Radiohead the next time an open mic night comes around and as a result I'm forcing myself to learn songs all the way through. I engineered and produced my band's album and as a reward, got 1,000 copies of it (900 or so of which are in my car now. Want to buy a CD? :) ) Even this blog is in some ways a test of my ability to come up with a coherent thought and regurgitate it.

So anyhow, I don't know if what this lady told me will affect my approach to work for my last couple of months here, but I should really try to get out of that habit before I go back to school. Because, like, this time counts, you know?