Rhyming words

It's been damn near forever since I've posted anything, mainly because I've suddenly become a homeowner. One of these days, I'll actually get around to blogging about the progress of the renovations, but every time I have a moment to write I become acutely aware that I could be using that time to patch/sand/prime/paint/tear out/put in/restore/remove something in the house. Is there a variant of that old chestnut "If there's time to lean, there's time to clean" -- so often heard at shitty jobs coming from the mouths of shitty bosses -- that could apply to my situation? "If there's time to blog, there's time to..." The rhyming words that immediately come to mind don't seem to fit.

Oh well.

Above is a photo from (surprise) the 4th of July (hence the fireworks) -- one of the first days I allowed myself a break from working on the house.

Inventory

I have been a long-time fan of the A.V. Club's take on pop-culture. While parent publication, The Onion, gets regularly compiled in book form, there has only been one A.V. Club book thus far -- the [quite good, by the way] interview collection Tenacity Of The Cockroach, which was published in 2002. The A.V. Club is finally putting out a second book this October, this time a collection of writings their "Inventory" feature -- which one could probably deduce from the title:

Inventory: 16 Films Featuring Manic Pixie Dream Girls, 10 Great Songs Nearly Ruined by Saxophone, and 100 More Obsessively Specific Pop-Culture Lists

It's the type of thing I enjoy way more [perhaps] than I should.

On a related note, I'm curious to check out A.V. Club head writer Nathan Rabin's new memoir (a genre I tend to approach cautiously) which is due out soon:

The Big Rewind: A Memoir Brought To You By Pop-Culture

From the advertising copy:

Rabin writes movingly about how pop culture helped save him from suicidal despair, institutionalization, and parental abandonment -- throughout a childhood that sent him ricocheting from a mental hospital to a foster home to a group home for emotionally disturbed adolescents.

I have a soft spot for the "saved by pop-culture" idea. Always have. Probably always will. I might have more to say on the subject at some point, but my laptop is doing the overheating thing again (which is fun, because it starts making sounds like Chewbacca fucking a Roomba) so, I'm just going to cut this short for now.

Looking forward to forgetting

A few nights ago I was watching The Daily Show and during a commercial break I caught a very familiar piano melody -- the one that opens Matt & Kim's "Daylight."* Bacardi is using the track in their recent ad campaign which (as far as I can tell from cursory searching) began airing sometime early last month:



Oh, and just so we're clear up front about this: I have no intention of tossing around any accusations of "selling out" (ah, that old and overused idiotic term) or other similarly adolescent nonsense. No one likes the guy in the room who says things like "Oh, I used to like that band, but now they're a bunch of sellouts."

That said, I'm still fairly amused by the late comedian Bill Hicks' take on the subject**:

If you do a commercial, you're off the artistic roll-call forever... There's a price on your head. Every word you say is suspect... And that goes for everybody, except Willie Nelson... I just try to avert my eyes whenever he's singing about tacos.

Thanks to YouTube, said commercial -- which, years ago, Willie Nelson did to help pay off his gigantic IRS debt -- is preserved for all to see:



In a strange way, it's better (from my perspective as listener and fan) if an artist performs some new jingle for a commercial, thus at least preventing their catalog of songs I actively listen to from conjuring up the brand in question. It does bum me out a little bit that when I hear Matt & Kim's "Daylight", my brain will continue to bring up the association with Bacardi. Which, of course, is certainly among the goals for the advertising campaign, and why Bacardi is willing to pay to use the song. If you know anything about just how little musicians tend to get paid, it's also easy to understand why artists say yes.

The nice thing is that, in time, Bacardi will move onto the next ad campaign, and perhaps I'll eventually forget all about it. That's my hope, at any rate. We shall see. It doesn't work all the time. I certainly haven't forgotten about Of Montreal allowing their song "Wraith Pined to the Mist" to have the lyrics completely repurposed to suit the needs of Outback Steakhouse:



While searching for that commercial, I also discovered that Of Montreal also did a commercial for T-Mobile, in which they also star:



I was also surprised recently when one of the most recognizable songs in The Sea And Cake catalog, "Jacking The Ball", recently found its way into a CitiBank commercial:



It's of no use to complain about it, in part because I'd likely have a difficult time turning down cash for music I'd written were someone to offer, unless it were for something absurdly (or unrealistically) horrible -- as in, "No, sir, you may not use that song in your new advertisement for cholera." Also, complaining would be pretty darn futile.

I do, though, look forward to the point in the future when I've put these ads -- and the numerous others featuring music I care about -- out of mind.

_________
* It's a damn catchy song. On a recent trip to Chicago, there were multiple occasions when, while walking down the street, I would spontaneously begin humming the piano line out loud. Tangentially, I refused to pick up the LP while I was there, because I've always had a hard time accepting that I liked Matt & Kim, in part (as I explained to my friend Jon, in the record store where he had pointed out that the album, Grand, was in stock) because Matt & Kim were sort of similar to Mates Of State, and I had spent nearly 10 years hating Mates Of State, and it felt like enjoying Matt & Kim was to admit that I had been wrong all these years about Mates Of State. I have since both bought Grand and relistened to some of the Mates Of State catalog -- I remain unconvinced overall, but will admit now that they have their moments.
** The bit is, primarily, a brutal skewing of Jay Leno, in no small part because of Leno hocking Doritos. In case you've never heard it, the version from Rant In E-Minor appears below:

Disconnect

I've been listening to Metric's new album, Fantasies, fairly obsessively lately... wait, sorry... let me back up a bit.

So, in 2006 Emily Haines released her solo record, Knives Don't Have Your Back, which was one of my favorite records of the year, and [hands down] my favorite album title of the year. I can't remember exactly what prompted me to pick Knives up. (I think at that point I was only vaguely aware of Metric, and I was only just beginning to get into Broken Social Scene -- a band I had avoided listening to for so long simply because they seemed to get so much damn press. And yes, I'm aware that such a reaction is fairly petty, and in this particular case a disservice to myself.) No matter the catalyst, I'm thankful I found it, as it was a record that truly resonated right with me. So beautiful and sparse and melancholy. God, her voice. There's something about Emily Haines' voice that absolutely slays me.

Thus began my little crush on Emily Haines.*

I'm really not prone to developing celebrity crushes. It very rarely happens to me. Sure, most everyone has their list (hopefully only a mental one) of movie and/or rock stars they'd love to spend a night in bed with, but that's really just one aspect of attraction. Crushes are such a different beast -- there's this [psuedo-] emotional component in addition to the aesthetic (read: carnal) attraction. Sure, there's the desire for the night in bed, but first you want to do John Cusack-ian things together like falling in love while learning to ski the K-12 and rebuilding a '67 Camaro. I think it's often about a (clearly falsely) perceived emotional connection -- something about their tone, their style that resonates. It's not too difficult a thing to swat down, because it is so obviously a one-sided thing and not an actual connection, merely the observation and recognition of personally desirable qualities.

Fast-forwarding a bit: I've been listening to Metric's new album fairly obsessively lately -- it's such a wonderful piece of smart pop music. Being back on an Emily Haines kick, I decided to put Knives on the stereo while on my drive home last night. In the song "Crowd Surf Off a Cliff" she sings the lines "I'd rather give the world away / than wake up lonely," which, especially due to the tone she sings this with, always gets me -- in one of those "God, I know that feeling" sorts of ways. I had just enjoyed a very fun and awesome evening, but while listening to this song, I couldn't help but think about a conversation that was had, which basically revolved around myself and two of my friends being in fairly similar positions -- namely, that the three of us were dealing with feeling weirdly and deeply fucked up by relationships that were long over and that we had no desire to revisit. Speaking only for myself, it's a strange thing, feeling so over a person in every way, but unable to change the fact that I am a vastly different person as a result of my experiences; that I have built walls (as the old-as-dirt adage goes) and that there are ways in which I isolate myself long past what seems necessary. Despite the wonderful evening, I couldn't help but take that song in, and briefly reminisce about feelings of loneliness -- thinking about the frustration of waking up alone, and also just-as-bad/sometimes-worse feeling of waking up lonely despite company. With that on my mind, I sent out the following message via Twitter**:

Emily Haines, stop breaking my heart.

An hour or two later, I received an email:

Metric is now following you on Twitter!

I found myself feeling oddly embarrassed about what I had written -- despite the awareness that I had been added by a publicist through automated means, combing search terms, with the desire that I will, in return, add Metric to my own Twitter feed, thus allowing a direct pipeline to me (the likely fan) for promotional information. I'm more than aware (and actually quite glad) that no one in Metric is following my life on their cell phone. ("Ben's trying to decide if he should get out of bed to get the Lester Bangs biography from his car." "The Jim DeRogatis one? That was pretty decent." "Oh, shit.... he's totally got a thing for you, Emily!" "Jim DeRogatis does?" "No, that guy Ben we started following on Twitter tonight." "Ha ha.")

This is tangential (and perhaps should have just been a footnote), but: I've never quite understood why there are such heated discussions and strong opinions in regards to Twitter -- I feel that both the "It's the most amazingest thing that ever was or will be"-camp and the "It's destroying the very fabric of the universe with it's banality"-camp are equally insane and expending way more energy than necessary on something that is fairly harmless and innocuous. (Interestingly, this exact same debate seems to happen over Chuck Klosterman, and I retain basically the same stance.)

Alright, so... Irrationally embarrassed, I thought back to something I had written in a recent email exchange regarding the new Metric album with a friend, and I felt strangely (and sillily) glad that it wasn't something that I had said publicly (ah, irony) on Twitter:

One day Emily Haines will marry me, and life will be perfect.

I think for many music-obsessed people, there is a lot of casual hyperbole and hero worship. It's not intentional. It just happens. It's all part of that odd one-sided feeling of connection that some song or album evokes in us. Friends and fans connect to one another through having like-minded idolatry; a similar connection stirred even while listening on headphones and stereos separated by a thousand miles distance.

At this point in my life, so many of my friends are are flung fairly far and wide across this country and beyond. I find myself quite thankful for the explosive growth and widespread adoption of social networking tools and the variety of ways in which they can provide some semblance of connection to the day-to-day realities of far-away friends. I'm aware that things like Facebook and Myspace are, at their core, merely platforms for generating advertising revenue. (Which is fine, as the developers to code these new communication tools and the electricity needed to power the arrays of servers on which these tools run aren't, obviously, free.) With a quickly expanding user-base, in no small part due to the [absurd] amount of media coverage, of course a wide variety of commercial interests have begun to investigate ways to use Twitter. That's not inherently bad, per se (just as it certainly isn't inherently good either). I can't help but think about the language and terminology of social networking. On Facebook or Myspace, we might have plenty of people on our Friends List who are not, in reality, our friends. Twitter's use of the word "follower" is interesting as it is, in my mind at least, such a loaded term. It'd be foolish to take these terms too literally of course. I guess I just find it fascinating that with all our new communication tools, it can be so easy to break past the metaphors and feel a real sense of disconnect.

Of course, disconnecting from something that is illusory isn't such a bad thing. In the practical reality of my life, I'm not affected much by the awareness that Emily Haines is not actually following the mundane details of my life on Twitter (again, I'm relieved, in fact), just as there aren't any pangs of heartbreak with the knowledge that the odds of us marrying are effectively zero. I would, however, love to learn the ship date for the vinyl copies of Fantasies.

(Photo above by Wendy Lynch for Under The Radar.)

__________
*Interestingly, spell check suggests that Haines is not a word, and offers to replace it with Highness.
**I have a hard time bringing myself to use "tweet" as a verb.

Vonnegut plus make-outs

So true, A Softer World. So true.

Sign of the times

Gee, thanks. I feel so much safer.

This sign is posted outside of a 7-11 that I go to with some regularity. Somehow, I had not noticed the sign until this morning. It's the eyes that really get me. The graphic designers involved in making this clearly decided to go for the classic dystopian future look.

If anyone has finds other images in this vein, please send 'em this way. I'd like to put together a whole gallery.

Why you gotta be like that, Hollywood?

This morning I saw that a friend had posted the following story to Facebook: Michael Bay Signs $50M Deal To Fuck Up Thundercats. For a brief moment, I didn't see that the link was to an article in the Onion rather than a Hollywood news blog. It's just the sort of thing that seems so plausible. Relieved that it wasn't real, I went about my afternoon internet surfing. I then found an actual headline which was much worse: Zac Efron Confirmed for Jonny Quest.

Goddammit.

I know that just because Jonny Quest is being turned into a big-budget, live-action film, it doesn't mean that the original cartoon that I love is ruined. Still, I can't help my gut reaction to this news, which is to be upset, annoyed, and... well, actually a little confused, now that I think about it. Is Jonny Quest that well known, even? I sort of understand the logic of trying to make a buck off of a live-action Scooby-Doo. (To clarify, I don't condone it, but I do get it.) It was certainly the more well known Hanna-Barbera property, and it was a definitely a huge staple of the average Gen-Xer's cartoon diet. By contrast, Jonny Quest, which originally aired from '64 to '65, was the one you had to dig at least a little bit to find out about. I guess I don't have much frame of reference for how successful the more recent reboot of the series was, but it never seemed to me like it had much impact. Perhaps the success of The Venture Brothers is responsible for the renewed interest, but it still seems be a pretty small niche market to attempt to appeal to.

My mind is racing with questions. Such as: "Why?" ("To make a buck.") and "How is Zac Efron going to play an 11-year old boy?" ("He won't. We've updated the character.") and "Oh fuck, you're going to totally fuck up the tone and try to make it sort of serious and modern, aren't you?" ("Yes. And we've added an awesomely hot love interest for Jonny. We've even got this awesome shot storyboarded out where we see, in the reflection off the lens of the walking eye robot, her and Jonny getting it on! It's awesome!") and "Seriously, WHY...?"

I know, too, that every time something is remade and reimagined for the big screen, someone's going to be screaming that its a bad idea. ("What? They're turning L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz into a movie? Good grief. I shan't stand for this!") It's always toughest for those that really love the source material. It's hard to not be protective and on the defensive. It's like Hollywood is the leather-jacket-clad motorcycle-riding bad boy taking our sister out on a date. "You better be good to her, man!" It's really only a tiny bit better when Hollywood is the Nick Andopolis-esque nice-guy suitor who perhaps loves a bit too much -- i.e. Peter Jackson's take on King Kong or Zack Snyder's take on, well, everything.

I know that it's difficult to transform one medium to another, and downright impossible to satisfy everyone. I also know, as far as pop-culture crimes go, it could probably be worse than a live-action Jonny Quest movie.

... just not much. Dammit.

I'm going to sulk and listen to ELO.

(The image above is from the Classic Jonny Quest site.)


"Don't Bring Me Down" by Electric Light Orchestra

Cutest robots ever

Tweenbots. The name conjures up the image of a robot army of Hannah Montana fans, or Terminators as designed by Sanrio.

Created by Kacie Kinzer as part of her thesis research, Tweenbots are:

... human-dependent robots that navigate the city with the help of pedestrians they encounter. Rolling at a constant speed, in a straight line, Tweenbots have a destination displayed on a flag, and rely on people they meet to read this flag and to aim them in the right direction to reach their goal.

Very cool. Also, adorable.

(Found via Slashdot.)

I had forgotten about this

This is a short video I did a few years ago, that I recently found on one of my external drives. My friend Burke had inherited his grandfather's record player and record collection, and I decided to make a short video piece about that. This is the initial rough cut -- I never did get around to doing a final version. Ultimately, I would have liked to trim the length down by at least a third, and made the whole thing a bit tighter. Also, the title was always just a placeholder -- never did figure out what I actually wanted to title it, so its currently stuck with a name I hate.

I hope to upgrade my video set-up one of these days (this was shot on a Hi-8 camera purchased sometime in 2001), but its hard to justify the expense. However, I'd love to do more pieces in this vein -- conversational documentary sort of stuff.

Cats and guerrillas

While house/cat-sitting this week, I spent a bit of time importing some music into my iTunes -- much of it 80's pop and rock. A good deal of that is stuff I've gotten on vinyl but hadn't until now bothered to track down digital versions. One of the things I imported was Darwin's Theory Of Pelvic Revolution by Urban Guerrillas -- a fairly obscure Minneapolis new-wave-ish band from the early-80's. My friends Kelly and Laura, who I am house/cat-sitting for, introduced me to them many, many years ago -- probably somewhat around the previous time I house-sat for them (which was, I believe, the summer of 1997). The album was not, to my knowledge, ever released on CD -- the copy I imported was a rip of the vinyl. Speaking of which, I was so overjoyed at being reminded about this band that I had to see if anyone had a copy of the vinyl on Ebay -- and indeed there were a few floating around. I managed to find one cheap one, so we'll see what the condition is like when it shows up in the mail sometime this week. Someone remind me that I need to pester my friend (and fellow midwesterner and music geek) if he remembers these guys. I'm willing to bet he does.

UPDATED: Here's the link to download the whole album.

"Repetition" by Urban Guerrillas

"Sex Beat" by Urban Guerrillas

Family affairs

A few days ago, I happened to be discussing with my mother some of the vinyl I had been tracking down over the last few months. I mentioned that I had recently found nice, clean used copies of the few Sly & The Family Stone records that had been missing from my collection. My mother -- who, when I was growing up, seemed to have a collection primarily made up of Judy Collins and Tom Rush records (okay, and yes, The Beatles too) -- responded with a great deal of enthusiasm: "Oh, I used to love Sly & The Family Stone!"

Now, I know it's not like Sly records are super obscure, having as they did quite a few number one hits -- but I was still taken by surprise. Never once growing up did I see or hear a Sly & The Family Stone record, or anything else remotely similar. When I was given what was left of the family record collection (much of which had been lost over the many, many moves before I was even born) it consisted mainly of a bunch of classical records, The Beatles' White Album and Best Of: 1967-1970, Cat Stevens' Teaser And The Firecat, and my sisters' Doctor Who picture discs. It certainly didn't include There's A Riot Goin' On or Stand!

My folks have always enjoyed music, but they can at times make that fact very easy to forget. My dad -- despite having hearing troubles -- used to be a hi-fi addict, piecing together the best possible stereo equipment he could afford (basically all of which was sold during the leaner years -- much to my, and my dad's, sadness now). While living in New York City, he and a friend used to build bizarre electronic music devices and do avant performances together. (Side note: when I sent my mom a tape of the noise rock band I played in when I lived in Virginia, her first reaction was "This reminds me of the stuff your dad used to do. How fun.") However, despite living in New York, he and my mother declined to go to Woodstock "because it was raining, and that didn't seem like it'd be much fun." My sister and I like to tease them about that.

My favorite music growing up was always The Beatles. I can't even guess at how many times I listened to the White Album. I loved singing along to that record -- even if the songs didn't always make much sense. ("Why don't we do what in the road?") One of my favorite songs was "Rocky Raccoon." There's something great about thinking about the six or seven year old version of myself running around the living room while reciting lines like "The doctor came in / stinking of gin" or "Rocky had come / equipped with a gun / to shoot off the legs of his rival." The latter is especially funny to me, as my sister and I were both expressly forbidden to play with toy guns. Even pointing sticks or fingers and yelling "bang!" was frowned upon, though it was tolerated.

I remember eventually the family retired the record player when they bought, as a Christmas gift to themselves, a CD player. I have the recollection that one of the first CDs opened that Christmas morning was Genesis' We Can't Dance -- though, perhaps that one came a bit later. (I may mock now, but I do remember quite enjoying it at the time. Hey, Patton Oswalt has a whole bit about how he used to love Phil Collins' No Jacket Required, so I'd like to think I'm in good company. I was young. Cut me some slack.) I remember them re-buying a lot of The Beatles discography on CD. There was also lot of Enya. No Sly, though.

Over the years, I've enjoyed introducing my folks, particularly my mom, to new music. Some of the first successes were Low and Morphine. (There's something very satisfying about being able to say the sentence: "Yeah, I got my mom into Morphine.") Interestingly enough, when Mark Sandman, the lead singer of Morphine, died, it was my mother who called me with the news. Sigur Ros and Belle & Sebastian have also been big hits. Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings also went over really well. I think Headlights and Camera Obscura were also enjoyed, but I'm not sure if they've entered her collection yet. Neutral Milk Hotel was one of the few that didn't go over quite as well as expected. ("It's interesting, but I don't know if I like his voice.") I'm thinking that the next time I have an occasion to give a gift though, it'll have to be some Sly.


"Family Affair" by Sly & The Family Stone

You ain't no Casanova

A crazy person on the L train mumbled the following statement to another rider, and I was lucky enough to overhear:

Man, you gots to learn yo' math-a-matics, 'cuz you ain't no Casanova.

Words of wisdom, to be sure. In fact, later that evening, in his address to the joint session of Congress, Obama said:

And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training... dropping out of high school is no longer an option. It’s not just quitting on yourself, it’s quitting on your country – and this country needs and values the talents of every American.

It's basically two different approaches to saying the same thing. That's right, America -- you ain't no Casanova.

Above: Lake Michigan, as seen from Loyola.

Thoughts on the process

I've been having an exceptionally difficult time writing lately. More specifically, it's been problematic trying to translate the barrage of noise in my head into anything more tangible. I can't really tell which is worse -- having no ideas or having a ton of ideas, none of which are shouting loudly enough to get the proper attention.

I've tried to write this post (and many others) a number of times, but I genuinely worry about this blog becoming a diary of artistic and personal meltdown. It's also exceptionally hard to communicate about creative struggles and internal processes and so forth without sounding, well, angst-y. I suppose it's always going to be hard to not come across as angst-y when you're a homeless (only technically) chronic depressive in the midst of artistic crisis. It's a shame, really. I've got quite a good sense of humor about it all.

No matter the medium, I tend to start working from fragments that seem interesting to me -- an interesting sound or tone that I play around with until there's a song; a color in a photograph that inspires a piece of design; a phrase that appears in my head while driving that becomes the foundation for a chorus. I don't like thinking about what a piece is about until the end of the process, if not well after it is completed. The best work I've done has been that which pours out of me without much active thinking until its time for editing. Lately, I seem to be thinking the opposite way: wanting to create something about X, about Y. I suppose for some people, that's the right way to work. Nice and linear. For me, I find it is stifling. It means I find myself upset when I can't find a sound that feels like X, a phrase that sums up Y. I'm pretty solidly an abstract-random. Linear rarely works for me.

Ultimately, I have to remember to keep my eyes open. I've got to find interesting haystacks, rather than hoping there's needles in the one I happen to be near -- especially since I have a fear of needles.

Unrelated: The image above was taken a few minutes ago, while I was sitting on the front steps of my friends' house. It's nice to be able to sit outside without needing the warmth of a wool pea coat.

I know I just posted an M83 track, but this one also seems appropriate.


"Teen Angst" by M83

... but what will shopping do?

I fell into The Gap, and found this reversible zip sweater and pair of black skinny jeans (on sale). I treated myself to it because I deserve it. Yes. That's my justification.

Stripes equal teh hotness, right?

I can't stop text messaging my friend Aaron with things like:

i'm a mess of anxiety and 90's guitar pop.

and:

teh hotness. fer rlz.

and:

stop being better at life than me.

That is all for the moment. Oh, also... there's a Television record on the stereo.


"Venus" by Television

Attic music

I am working away at something. I dislike my own impatience, but I have a sense where things will start heading. All things in time.

UPDATE:
Below is a piece of something that is being worked on. Sadly it contains none of the guitar parts, as I'm not really able to fully record right now. However, it's a hint at what is in the works.

Frustration

I've been having an incredibly difficult type writing anything lately. It has nothing to do with the broken laptop key that I can't be bothered to fix. I believe it's mainly a result of being out of practice, but I am starting to get incredibly frustrated with the difficulty I am having of getting things out of my brain and into, say, words.

I'm finding myself at one of those mind-racing-with-things-except-for-when-I'm-near-a-writing-implement sorts of places.

Winter turns me far too useless.

Excuses, excuses. Bullshit.

I am having trouble telling if everything in my brain is simmering and getting ready to turn into something, or if there's just smoke but no fire -- I'm mixing my heat-related metaphors here. I'm having a fair amount of anxiety around, well, actually all my creative processes, and I tend to deal with that badly. There's a lot of second-guessing and a lack of drawing meaningful or interesting connections.

More excuses. I know, I know, I know.

Celebration

I was very excited for the inauguration festivites today -- though was thwarted from watching the affair live by a faltering internet connection that has just only recently started working again. We listened to Obama's swearing in and speech over a crackling radio. Very retro.

That all was followed by record shopping and Chinese food.



Both images above are of Lake Como in Saint Paul, taken in the fall. They are thoroughly unrelated to inauguration day, Le Tigre reissues or broccoli beef, but Como Park is a place I love and I'd like to think about good things today.

Bush is really gone now. That's certainly a good thought.

The Cats of Madison Manor

I apologize for the excessive cuteness, but I do love these cats so much. Kenobi is the one in the foreground; Solomon is the ball of fur in the background. The image above is now the background on my cell phone, which brings me joy every time I look at it.



In addition to being adorable, they also make nice feet/leg warmers while I sleep.



I should also mention, mainly for Seth, that it will be quite some time before the word 'cat' appears in the subject of one of my posts. I know he will appreciate that. Unrelated, the music that happens to be in my head at the moment is below:


"Ever Fallen In Love" by The Buzzcocks

Snapshots of Boston

I was planning on writing something longer and more essay-ish for the first real post on this blog. I'll get to that eventually. For the moment, here's a bit of cell phone photography.



The weather out in Boston has been a little bit crazy for the last few days, resulting in canceled flights and huge amounts of time on hold while waiting to talk to a customer service representative. Above: views from the apartment of my friends, Anna and Aaron, shortly before learning that my flight was definitely not happening. Below: the street view in the evening, shortly after I managed to get my new flight details confirmed.



I'm not sure why, but for some reason I can't stop listening to Aqueduct's Power Ballads album this evening.


"Growing Up With GNR" by Aqueduct