audblog audio post

for some reason, i'm more apt to believe this review of star wars than the other ones.

i feel somewhat like a cripple with this cast on. it's a soft cast, thickest i've ever seen; i can't fit it through any of my clothes, except for a blue over-sized sweatshirt that i have that makes me look like my right arm is a bulging mass of flesh and bone. tomorrow i get a hard cast. i've been with this soft one for a little over a week, and i find myself wishing i had an accelerated healing factor. people ask what happened, or say stuff like, "boy, i bet that hurt." or, "ouch!" or, "hope you had fun doing whatever you were doing." most of the time i shrug and laugh and try to avoid any further conversation. if someone asked, i started out explaining the entire situation: how i broke my wrist a long time ago, i didn't know and recently found out, that i needed bone graft surgery, etc., then just started telling people that i broke my wrist, so as to avoid meaningless banter that i could do without. if they ask how, i say skateboarding and it usually ends there. sure, most of the time people are just trying to be nice, but i find myself increasingly irritable at the fact that i can't take a shower, can't write (english, let alone japanese), it takes me twice as long to fucking dress myself, and i can't open a box of cereal without a knife; which all makes talking about the stupid cast an inexorable reminder that i cannot do things as quickly or as well as i could. i was on the bus the othe day and a man with thick skin took up two seats. his leg was propped up on one; it was blue and sinewy, and had a foot that seemed tighly crammed into the shoe. the shoe's seams seemed to be holding on for dear life, and the man carried a cane so as to prevent any increased pressure from traveeling to the toes and exploding the shoe. he sat there as i walked onto the bus and sat down a couple of seats away. i had in my headphones thinking they were a natural deterrent for bus small talk. not so. apparently, we had some sort of kinship in our injuries, and i was privy to the natural set of questions: "what'd you do?" he said. "broke my wrist." i replied. he kept talking, to whom i'm not sure, but the next stop, he picked himself up and limped toward the door slowly; limp, cane, swift swing of the good leg, and a hobble to the front step. the bus driver lowered him to the street. even though our conversation ended as abruptly as it had started, as he passed me, i fully expected a "good luck" or something, maybe i should have told him that, but we both said nothing. i probably shouldn't have been so curt with him. i'll probably heal, he probably won't. here the communication was less about sympathy, and more about empathy. i just failed to notice.

i feel like i haven't written anything worth-while in ages, instead sitting around wilting away into corners of the house with unread books and cds i've heard one too many times. the fact that the site was supposed to go away (and still may, although in the same way that i've always been so unsure about things, i'm not sure when) had partly to do with the lack of updates, but as some of the long term readers may have noticed, a long time ago i also shrank away from delving too deeply into personal issues, unless they had something to do with music, which also contributed to the dramatic drop in frequency of posts.. the main point of that change of direction had more to do with wanting to shed the artificiality the writing seemed to produce; you can see the pointed and stark turn if you look hard enough. there was a certain point where i thought i could get away with writing without any posturing, i wanted to stop whining (unsuccessful) and pandering to audiences of amorphous dwindling masses (aside). i wanted to stop wanting to be noticed and to just write without a conscience. that being impossible, i opted to try and sharpen the focus of the site into writing about music. that seemed to fail miserably, simply because i kept getting inspired in the same way about the same things and was unable to avoid that ubiquitous same-ness from showing up in the site. with less time to write, or perhaps, less to write, i tried to just write about things. i never really just tried to just blog things, give links that no one else has come across yet, and i'm not sure i can cover all the bases i want, but that's where we are now. with that, i've felt the need to explain myself, and the state of things here at sounds from a heart murmur. sadly, i don't have any information for heart murmurs on this site, and that's where a good bulk of the visitors come from. apparently a lot of people have dogs or cats with heart murmurs, too. in any case, if you happened to stumble by looking fo something like that and have unsuspectedly stepped into this rambling soliloquy, i beg your pardon and wish to direct you to google's directory search on heart murmurs, which i trust provides ample information on the topic. and with that, i leave you no less enlightened about anything, but take solace in the fact that i actually updated you on simple things, like me. just reminding you that i'm still here if you forgot, and still interested in the site, however itinerant that interest may be. this is what infinite egression looks like.

it doesn't take me long to get to sleep. five, maybe ten minutes. it seems almost a shame to put the best song last, but that's the order my list is in. feel free to change them up for yourself and let me know. it's about time i snoozed.

watching the news lately, i got curious as to what kind of numbers seattle produced so i found this article on murder in seattle and was surprised that it's been on the decline. i feel like this year has already set a precedent for a higher number.

the john vanderslice: fourtracker extended credits are fucking great, if you're a recording geek and you're curious about the stellar production work on the new record.

it's friday, it's been a week since my surgery, i can't type worth a shit still, and i get my hard cast on tuesday. i'm probably failing japanese, my internship is going great, and i still expect to grduate in june (as long as i get my shit together in jpn). enough of that. did everyone know that dr. frank had a war blog? yes, i'm pretty sure it's that dr. frank.

check out the flash beat mixer on the side: killakela.com

check out biz markie doing some sort of alien beatbox communication with will smith in men in black II

if you're interested, here's the petition to keep futurama on the air. i don't even know when it's on right now, but futurama gets pretty consistent laughs when i do catch it.

cannes film selections are out, including new stuff from mike leigh (naked, topsy-turvy) , p.t. anderson (magnolia, boogie nights) with adam sandler?! , michael winterbottom (a film on manchester music scene and the punk rock and acid house revolutions), david cronenberg (the fly, existenz) and atom egoyan (the sweet hereafter).

apparently we're not down yet, so i'll just keep posting until we are. anyways, check this out. you can enter a contest to have your song sung by brak: Once there, visitors can log into the "Brak Sings Your Song'' message board using their AOL, Netscape, CompuServe or AOL Instant Messenger Screen Name and post an entry by providing (1) a person's first name (2) a place and (3) a thing. The randomly selected Grand Prize Winner will receive a customized audio song written and performed by Brak himself. The Sweepstakes runs from now until May 19th. oh, did everyone hear about the new punisher movie and the movie-adaptation of hawaii five-o?

i don't know if anyone's gonna get this before services go down, but they are going down, and the site will no longer exist (at least in this form). whenever i get money to get a host, or if i find another way to host the site, i'll do that. but for now, this is farewell. thanks again for everyone that's helped out with the website and for everyone visiting. talk to you soon.

does anyone have any recommendations for web hosts? i'm looking for something around 150 megs storage (minimum), 1 gig transfer, cgi bin, cheap, reliable. thanks.

i'm somewhat proud to say that this page comes up as the number 1 search for how to steal someone's heart who already has a boyfriend. funny, isn't it? in class today, someone was drinking something that smelled excruciatingly like b.o.

this tagline for XXX (starring vin diesel) made me laugh out loud: "Xander Cage is an extreme sports athelete recruited by the government on a special mission."

i know it's not spring break anymore, but i still went to see clockstoppers (directed by none other than cmdr. ryker) the other day, and i can't decide whether or not i regret it. in any case, something good kind of came out of it, as we have run into a situation that enables us all to explore our deal-making and deal-breaking skills. the situation, comes with the advent of the wheel. because we all know: bust a deal, face the wheel. james spun the wheel last night, and his punishment (i think it'd be best to not look at it as a punishment, more like payment) is to create an album of cover songs. one of the songs to be included is bombs over baghdad, but there are many more to be named. i also saw mulholland drive the other day, which was about what i expected: creepy, disturbing, tedious, arguably brilliant, and utterly confusing. feeling sick today, which accounts for the fact that i haven't gone to school. i haven't put much effort into school this quarter, likely because it's my last quarter until i graduate, and then i'm free from the shackles of school and look to lock myself into some odd terrible job that i'll end up complaining about. i am, however, enjoying talking about philosophy again, even if it is descartes.

case in point: jeff buckley on alias tonight.

i just heard that dog on buffy. it's strange how the increase of good music has increasingly become a part of good shows (gilmore girls not inclusive).

i haven't been posting because it's been a busy week. i've been trying to get all my surgery stuff out of the way and had school and an interview on tuesday. i haven't yet gotten tickets to the trail of dead show tonight, so it doesn't look like i'll be going. i also missed jonathan richman last friday, too because i have to start rationing my money to see shows. i got a stupid ticket today. i keep trying to get all my shit together, but it just keeps falling apart into ugly, stinky little messes.

i have to get a bone graft. that means they cut my wrist open, take a little bone from my forearm, put it in between the bone that i broke, put some pins in to keep the bone in place, and then wait until the bone mends together. sounds like fun, huh? i saw lightheavyweight and the prom the other night at the liquid lounge. it as an interesting show, although the place is a bit strange. lightheavyweight were great, josh's voice is very jeff buckley-esque, amazingly so. the songs were tight despite a few sound problems early on, it sounded great - i'd give a heavier nod to the acoustic songs he played beforehand though. the prom were good too, the keys were nice and the drummer looks an awful lot like chris. you can check out some lightheavyweight songs here, and for the prom, you can check out the barsuk site (in the discography section).

about 7 years ago, i sprained my wrist skateboarding. last week i went to the doctor because my wrist has been aching more than usual lately. she called for an x-ray, and it turns out i broke my wrist 7 years ago, not merely sprained it. i go back in to ortho today to see if they want to break it again so the fracture will mend correctly. and to think, all those years i told people i have never broken a bone, i was lying. i can't wait to break it again.

the latest Josh Rouse record, under blue stars is great. it's full of stereo recordings that travel, and his voice is mildly gravelly and pinched, which is more than endearing. here is a track, the first off the album: nothing gives me pleasure

spiderman 2 is set, written by the writers of smallville. incidentally, the plot will involve someone getting exposed to kryptonite and getting superpowers, a car accident, and spiderman pulling them from the car crash.

further evidence that static schlock is crap and should never have ousted batman beyond or just regular batman - aj mclean of the backstreet boys is guest starring.

did see clem snide, and was impressed. also saw death to smoochy and donnie darko (which didn't fit in with the framework of "bad" that the others did). death to smoochy reminded me of sitting as a child late at night on friday or saturday watching evening at the improv. i would watch the show, thinking, "damn, everyone's laughing, something funny must be going on. i just don't get it, though, 'cause i'm a youngin'." well my friend, there wasn't shit to get, and the same goes for devito's "pitch dark comedy." whoever said that has got to wake up and let devito know that he has some weak shit on his hands. the jokes were used and overused, and were well without wit (one line was "he's hiked up higher than a prom dress in june" in reference to someone high on smack). i will say that ed norton had a funny song or two, but lacked an overall impressive performance. his humor failed in keeping the faith (which was carried by ben stiller and that guy in the karaoke shop) and it fell pretty flat here, and robin williams was boring and predictable. i did take a liking to some one-liners from the irish gang, though. donnie darko, on the other hand, was great. it was fun to think about and had pieces to put together. it did a great job of choking the hints out in order to push the story forward. i'm kinda pissed that the weakest link isn't on at 5 and 530 anymore, leaving me with a sorry selection between repeats of roseanne and 7th fucking heaven. speaking of 7th heaven, the oldest kid was the "sensitive guy" in sorority boys, which, by the way, i enjoyed more than death to smoochy. but i hate to admit what that says about me.

clem snide is currently on the kexp live right now, playing moment in the sun. when asked if he does any writing on tour, the lead singer replied, "i don't do anything on tour. i stare out the window and smoke pot. that's it." steve zoom later asked him if he thought being a new father would affect his songwriting, he replied, "yeah," in a deadpan monotone, "i'm gonna lose my edge." i'll try and see them tonight at the croc (if it hasn't sold out yet...)

quickly: i saw blade 2, and i'd use brandon's words about it being "disgusting and beautiful" but then i'd have to worry about it sounding stupid. unfortunately, it's too late for that. in any case, if you play roulette, you should still always bet on black. i'm not sure which bad movie is next, but sad to say, this is in the running.

that's right, i saw califone the other night with scott but i bailed early 'cause i got tired and needed to write a paper. califone was very good. the terror sheets opened and they were reverb drenched and big drums plus chimey keys; a good sound. i think scott went to the graceland tonight, and i went to the crocodile to see john vanderslice play. apparently ben from kols ditched the tour (they were supposed to play there tonight, but didn't), and the mendoza line ended up playing first. we got there late, because there's never any parking in belltown and we were watching the amazing race (gutsy grannies got kicked off). john vanderslice was great. christopher, the touring drummer had mad chops. seriously, he played the shit out of the drums tonight, and with a fretless hollowbody bass, on top of some distorted acoustic guitar, john's voice sounded great. the sound at the crocodile is pretty exceptional. if my ears could talk, they would say, thank you john, you have enriched us both. and i saw resident evil earlier this week. it was pretty funny. check the laser dodging action, it'll come in useful someday when you're stuck in a hallway with a vindicitive computer that wields lasers that can cut you in half. the key is in the shaky hands. continuing my bad movie spring break tradition (which i started last year), tomorrow i'll go see blade 2.

i had a final today in japanese. it was terrible. however, these things happened:

• i overheard someone say, "we were just waiting for the other foot to drop, and when it did, it was in our asses."
• my new favorite game is called "driving the whale bones home". the object of the game is to make "driving the whale bones home" the answer to any question anyone asks you. example: if someone asks you "why did you put your underwear on the outside of your pants?", you answer, "because i'm driving the whale bones home."
• on the way home, i was listening to ellen and ben but sang "i'm gonna pull that guy out of his car and make his ass eat curb like a sandwich." instead, because he was a jackass.

it's true i haven't lived in the area for a good 8 years, but i had no idea that santa rosa, ca ever spawned indie rock like the velvet teen does. i do, however, remember modest mouse touring the area and hitting the sebastopol community center. and there's some footage of further at the old vic in songs for cassevettes (which i got on video for my birthday a couple of years ago, because a friend of mine new the guy who directed it. weird.), so i guess it's always been there, i just wasn't looking hard enough (gimmie a break, i was 15 and went to catholic school). now that i think about it, the scenes in that movie with further (who have since disbanded and are now in beachwood sparks) made them seem downtrodden. it made for an interesting conflict, where the idea of the film was to portray some spirit that independent music lives in, and then it pits corporate majors against that spirit. further used to be on geffen, and hearing a band about talk about being dumped by their major is rare. it was the band was criticized (in a review) for seemingly pandering to majors while simultaneously condemning them - that doesn't seem like grounds for marking a film, person, or band inferior, but enables a clearer view on the situation, because nothing is ever cut and dry. just looking at bands on major labels now: built to spill, modest mouse, radiohead, etc. you can't ignore a band's work because they're on a big label, and wanting to be on a major label so people will hear your music doesn't strike me as a bad thing (although i can think of plenty of reasons not to be on a major - read steve albini's reasons for a good start (and hell, end, too)) that scene where he talks about that, and then they play the monterey festival to an empty theater, that juxtaposition was great. it was a good film, and fun to watch especially if you're into indie rock. i've read a few of the reviews that quibble about the band interviews and connections with cassevetes (one of the worst reviews i've ever read here, the first one - the last review makes some valid points though), but there's also plenty of good reviews about the film.

i just saw an old guy on a mountain bike riding down gilman street near my house with two plastic bags hanging from the handle bars and an old lawnmower in tow. i imagined the bags were full of grass and he was mowing lawns in order to create some chaos, some exacting madness that only made sense in his mind. he would randomly select lawns and ride through them with the lawn mower, creating fat lawn stripes in people's front yards. go old guy on mountain bike with lawn mower in tow! i had a dream last night that i was arguing with someone saying that bob pollard should retire to palm springs, dry up and start playing golf before he dies of cirrhosis.

finally got around to encoding both songs, and since i could never decide which one to put up, i've put them both up. one is straight from the 7", which doesn't sound as good as the actual vinyl (so buy it at pool or pond), but some is better than none. the recordings here are done by chris walla - the drums particularly sound good, the bass drum kicks hard and big in stark contrast to the tight, high snap of the snare (which is perfect, because ryan's drums are insanely good anyway). the first time i saw lands farther east play live was at 20th century bowl in bellingham (incidentally, the same show i saw camden at). i can still see josh and mark standing legs apart and lifting their heels in step unison across the carpeted floor, with ryan in the back keeping time in the oddest way possible, putting in fills where you never thought they could fit. the guitars weave in and out of each other flawlessly, somewhat akin to that chicago style noodling of ghosts and vodka, but more aggressive. i cannot say enough good things about them. keep an eye open. email them at landsfarthereast -at- hotmail.com

i haven't yet figured out a way to organize my books. i've always thought that arranging your things in a way that only you can find what you need when you need it was the way to go. despite my recent denial of the efficacy of the film, i still think something like an autobiographical way of ordering your things would be fun. i don't remember if he did that in the book. i have around 500 cds. i reorganized them last night (or rather, just organized, because they were in no particular order) which took me quite a while. i was going to arrange them by hue again, but that was only effective when i could remember all of the album cover colors. now that i'm getting old and i only get more cds, my dotage is catching up to me and i have to think of another way to arrange them, so i did it geographically. starting with bellingham on down the west coast on the left, midwest in the middle, and new york, athens, east coast, etc. on the right, followed under by all the foreigners. i wish it was more intuitive, but i suppose that'll do.

i didn't get the latest superchunk album until much later than i had hoped due to the fact that i was on month long roadtrip and i needed the money for food and gas. i did, however, pick up the late century dream ep they released a little while beforehand, while i was in berkeley. on sept. 11th, we woke up early in oklahoma city and after we got an oil change we headed out of town we hit the highway south. we listened to the news for a little while in the car driving down to texas. i got sick of the news and listened to the ep instead, and i told alison that i was going to listen to it 10 times in a row. i listened to it more than 10 times in a row, while she fell asleep. about 4 years ago, i remember listening to indoor living. i got a poster of the album cover for christmas, and my favorite song off the album was "martinis on the roof". i always associated that song with the cover of the back of the bivouac lp where blake is looking into the camera with a glass of wine, and i wished that i still lived on the top floor of the apartment complex, where i lived the year before. i had someone buy me some vodka and vermouth and i used an old roommate's martini shaker and we made some martinis while eating cheetos. i remember not liking them, and just drinking the vodka straight instead. when i first moved to richland, somewhere around 8 or 9 years ago, i remember being in my brother's room and seeing the cover to here's where the strings come in. i also saw sunny day real estate's diary album. i never listened to much superchunk until later, and it wasn't even that album, it was foolish. josh and i skated on his driveway on the quarter pipe he built. he'd put the yellow boombox on top of the ramp and we'd skate back and forth on it. later (or earlier, i'm not sure which), he'd put "without blinking" on a tape for me, and my brother would borrow the first superchunk album from me and listen to "slack motherfucker" a lot. the last 3 albums didn't come out in the right order for me. i've always thought that come pick me up was a brilliant album, but was almost too much jim o'rourke and not enough superchunk. here's to shutting up though, sounds more like it should have come out immediately after indoor living. but i hate to cavil about chronology. at first i wasn't as struck with the full album as much as i was with the ep, but it's still damn good, and has much more candor than the umbrella-ed influence o'rourke put on come pick me up. now don't get me wrong, i still think both albums are indispensable, albeit anachronistic. the ep served me a nice bridge though, thankfully, because they've availed such a fealty soundtrack for me.

i wrote a review of the opening show of the death and dismemberment tour. i know there's a typo (my proofreading skills suck), and my apologies in advance for the last line i wrote.

the all-star cast for the new doc on hip-hop includes: x-ecutioners, gang starr, dj shadow, afrika bambaataa, j5, dj qbert, mix master mike, and more. at scratchmovie.com

hadn't realized that about a boy was going to have a soundtrack by badly drawn boy. let's hope it'll turn out better than that teaser did. and the more i think about it, the more i think high fidelity wasn't that good, either. sure, jack black was funny, and the biggest laughs the film gets are the imaginary scenes where rob kicks tim robbins' ass, but those scenes had a completely different feel from the rest of the film. they went slapstick when the rest of the time they were trying to do dialogue comedy. it was just thin. admittedly, i own it and will probably watch it countless more times. hopefully i'll remember what i liked about it so much in the first place. why am i still up? the stomach is acting up again. stupid stomach.

"oh baby you got it goin' on...you lookin' so good...." the most important link i've ever come across during my foray (sometimes 8 hour stints a day) into the information superhighway: almost every skit from the state readily available for download in quicktime. sadly, we all know that katie holmes is now kind of officially part of the state after kissing ken marino on dawson's creek. (side note: finally saw jay and silent bob strike back last night, and enjoyed the scene with the pie fucker and dawson, and probably would have enjoyed the rest of the movie if i were, say, kevin smith or one of his lackees). the other day, james and i decided that if either of us became incredibly rich, we would pay each of the state members enormous amounts of money to do another season of the state. i'm gonna go buy a lotto ticket.

i'm pretty excited about the new project scott has going on over at introspekt. he's updating the pictures daily with their own soundtrack. today has some richard buckner. check it out.

thanks to missy for this link: moral philosophy selector here's my results, which are pretty on (i like the idea that free will exists and is essential):

1. Nietzsche (100%) 2. Sartre (94%) 3. Epicureans (86%) 4. Spinoza (85%) 5. Hobbes (84%) 6. Hume (81%) 7. Noddings (65%) 8. Stoics (60%) 9. Kant (59%) 10. Cynics (58%)

i think it's great that davey does some soul singin' on the new promise ring album (see: track 11 - Say Goodbye, Good). it's a good record, despite the bad reviews it'll probably get, because ever since their desperate attempt to escape the emo pigeonhole, everyone's loved to hate them. even before very emergency came out, it was obvious that nothing feels good was going to be the best thing they'd put out for their emo following. the new record is definitely more sedate than anything they've put out which will likely cause fans to say it's a vermont record disguised as tpr, which is a bit apocryphal, because vermont never did anything as tricky and polished as this. and it is polished. there's quite a bit of span on these songs and the instrumentation is much more diverse that the usual guitar-bass-drums sound. i hear a lot of soft bulletin-ish orchestral work on "suffer never" and it sounds good, for the most part. "stop playing guitar" is probably the closest the album gets to ...emergency (i think the hook is pretty damn close to that of "things just getting good"). overall, though, the album does well with the newness it incorporates. while it's not altogether new for music, it's certainly new for the band and it shows much more maturity in putting together something cohesive that doesn't wear away after a few listens. later this summer during some lazy hot afternoon, i'm sure the record will find it's way back into the cd player.

another thing: if the person that arrived here looking for "crotch ball" would like to let me know how to play, i'm all ears.

being as broke as i am, i've been trying to go to as many free things as possible. on saturday night i visited ye ol' elysian on capitol hill to take in some free music from robb benson (of nevada bachelors and dear john letters). i missed most of his set as we got there kind of late, but what i did get to see was great. robb's voice is a little pinched, but that's part of why i like it so much. it think it may have been a dear john letters song that i heard where he belts out the line "i hope you hurt like me" on the recording, and it wasn't as loud as i had wished at the elysian, but i suppose i wasn't right in front, either. tuesday night i went over to sonic boom records to catch the free in-store with woke up falling and that was a good time. the new drummer kept it together without missing a beat (sorry) and the singer's voice wavered well through the miasma of the acoustics in the record store. in any case, worth every penny. last night we checked out the new version of macbeth a la 1975. the film was well acted - specifically maura tierney, kevin corrigan and christopher walken. kevin corrigan's performance (complete with greasy hair, square glasses and dirty looking face) drew the most sympathy from the crowd, and christopher walken played an excellent vegetarian detective. the film dragged at certain points, and honestly i admit i was hoping to see some newsradio reunions, but i don't think andy dick and maura tierney ever had a scene together. andy dick was pretty much reprising matthew on weed, though. the movie is scotland, pa. see it, if you want. luckily, tomorrow night i've already got a ticket to the death and dismemberment show and am looking forward to the events. it's a full weekend. remember that shitty movie with emilio estevez and cuba gooding jr.? if anything, it gave us some interesting (and some not so interesting and downright shitty) collaborations between hip-hop and rock (although i'll take body count over ice-t and slayer any day). my point is, at least we got de la soul and teenage fan club. back in the day, i remember making skate videos and one in particular was when a friend of mine was skating in portland airport. he did a backside 180 in some hallway, and we put it in slow motion to this song. travelling, at the speed of light....

we lost kickball, 12-13 (i think). i made two errors and didn't score. i had a few singles, though. i decided on brak's mashed potatoes song as my theme song, but forgot the cd at home. no one else brough their theme songs anyway. i had fun anyway, though. i'm looking for something new to put up in the share section, so expect something there soon.

i posted this last year, a day late. i'm going to post it again, even though i'm in a wholly different situation than i was last year, because i think the article has some interesting points. and because i'm a goddamn cynic: The Love Bloat

when in doubt, bore your friends with your friday five: 1. What was the first thing you ever cooked? even if i could remember what i really cooked the first time i ever cooked anything, i think i'd still say that it was cereal, even if that's not cooking. 2. What's your signature dish? the easiest thing to cook in the world is adobo and it tastes damn good. i like cooking, hate cleaning, love eating. 3. Ever had a cooking disaster? (tasted like crap, didn't work, etc.) Describe. i've had many a disaster in my day. i was really high once (that is, hypothetically, if i did indeed smoke the gonj), i ate a bunch of chex with cheese melted on top and sour cream. it was like nachos, except without tortilla chips. i'm ashamed of the things i eat when i'm alone and i am broke (hence the mcguyver-esque concotions of shit and salsa meals). 4. If skill and money were no object, what would make for your dream meal? dream meal? i think the question sounds a little like "you're on death row and you have one least meal. what would it be?" i'd rather not think about that, so i abstain from the question. just kidding. steak and potatoes, like a real criminal. just kidding. if i had the choice, i wouldn't eat food. only hot dogs. * if you were a hot dog, and you were starvin' would you eat yourself? I know i would. I'd smother myself in brown mustard & relish. I'd be so delicious. we could make hot dogs our form of currency. 12 hot dogs would equal roughly a nickel... 5. What are you doing this weekend? my brain left for the weekend right after i took a test this morning. i probably bombed the test, disproving my aforementioned hypothesis of my brain leaving after i took the test. i'm looking forward to laying around on the couch balancing a beer on my belly and trying not get barf on my shirt. just kidding. i did that yesterday. have a good weekend. kickball!

3 day weekends are a great thing. this weekend, on president's day i may return to the baseball field (i've been there once before, i remember back in high school p.e., and i could "rope" them into the outfield) but this time, with no gloves and no bats. just some shoes, a red 4-square ball, and best of all, a theme song. the best thing i can imagine walking up to the plate with would be so fresh, so clean, but i'm open to suggestions. that's right, kickball with theme songs.

over at otaku house there's a video for all-time quarterback's plans get complex shot in a day for 6 bucks while ben was in london. it's pretty funny. aaron stewart needs dv cameras in seattle to shoot the dcfc show on the 22nd. if you have one, let him know so you can help out. everytime i say i'll take the weekend off of the blog, i don't. in any case, have a good weekend.

there's a lot of good shows coming up here this weekend in the northwest. because i hate to see that dumb post i made yesterday take up so much space at the top of the page, here they are:

• tonight: suffering & the hideous thieves, 31 knots, crictor, no. 226 at the graceland / jon auer at the sunset
• tomorrow (friday 2.8): the model rockets, the delusions, dear john letters / poseur, woke up falling, automaton, xxxaudio at the graceland
• saturday (2.6): beulah, john vanderslice, the long winters at the croc / dub narcotic sounds system, all girl summer fun band, c.o.c.o, ignis devoco industrial fire circus at the local 46 / radio nationals, richmond fontaine, memphis radio kings at the tractor

also, just found out fcs north should be out with a new ep next month on pacifico. they play next weds. at the i-spy.

  it's bad enough that it's raining out and all the shoes i like to wear are extremely vulnerable to water, but now this? walking, in the middle of red square, some kid was on his bike riding through the other kids trying to get their classes.   now, people's asses are just there, right? so i mean, things can happen, and people need to do what they need to do, but my question is: is it better when they do, or they don't?   forgive me for not getting to the point. some kid on his bike was riding with his ass pointed up in the air and his pants meandered up into his crack. i was unfortunate enough to catch a glimpse of this and i couldn't help but cringe and shiver after quickly averting my eyes.

  i've been meaning to put this song up for a while, actually the first song i wanted to put up was a kissing book song, but didn't have one on my computer at the time. but here it is, in it's entirety.   the first time i heard it, i was in a crowded club on capitol hill called the baltic room and it was smoky and everything had a red tinge to it. they were opening for the lucksmiths, and i remember standing up in the front and watching the drums kick in and andrew stand there before the mic with his hands grazing the keys in front of him.   the way the drums just drive along the bottom of the song and the bass and kick drum punch through the speakers is just so damn soothing. that night, hearing the song in the middle of the club was just another perfect moment, it caught the mood completely. not to be overly sentimental (i guess i'm a bit too late), but it makes me kind of sad that indie pop dance night is leaving the baltic room.

friday five: 1. Have you ever had braces? Any other teeth trauma? i've never had braces, though i probably should have. my brother did, and i remember seeing him sneak the headgear off sometimes. i haven't even had my wisdom teeth out, so they'll probably break my jaw sometime in the future. i also have a chip in my front right tooth, though i don't know where it's from. 2. Ever broken any bones? not yet. 3. Ever had stitches? i've had a few stitches. about 16 i think under my right kneecap. left a pretty nice scar. i fell while riding my bike and a rock ripped some skin out of my leg. i remember seeing it bleeding all over the place and thinking that it would stop soon and that it didn't hurt that much. later, i'd find out that the reason why was because the cut went deeper than my nerves. i was wearing shorts once and some kid asked me where i got the scar from. i told him i got shot in the knee and that the bullet was still in my leg. he thought that was pretty cool. 4. What are the stories behind some of your [physical] scars? chicken pox scar on my nose. scars on my knees from doing normal kid stuff. a few small scars on my back from falling into a rose bush. i was damn clumsy as a kid. 5. How do you plan to spend your weekend? no plans, yet, although i can safely say that i will have a glass of maker's on the rocks sometime. and maybe go bowling.

  last night, we bought a 12 pound ham for $6. we cut it in half and put it in the oven and ate it. it was really salty.   akira kurosawa thought at one point that he had run out of artistic steam. he tried to kill himself because of it. he lived through it, though, and put out more amazing work during his career, including madadayo, which means no, not yet, which was his last film to be released, and a very good film at that.

  changed up a few things, i'm sure it doesn't look so good on some browsers, i did away with all the tables and put everything in css-p. the site seems to resemble a cross-type structure now, more than before, i think. please let me know if it doesn't look so good on your browser.   this morning, around 1130, some jehovah's witnesses knocked on my door. they come 2 to 3 times a week, because my roommate talked to them once. now they come back all the time with pamphlets on how to make friends with god. aside: (once, they came and brandon was over. after he talked to them for a while, he began to wonder (as did james and i) why he didn't just answer the door in his underwear).   today, i answered the door knowing well that it was them. i swung the door open kind of suddenly, and looked down and saw a little girl dressed up in her sunday best. being saturday morning, i was confused.   i looked up and saw two young gentlemen dressed in suits, one of them standing behind the other, who looked rather shocked at me. i probably had a bit of bedhead hair.   "Is James home?" he asked.   "No." i replied quickly. they continued undaunted, and the man behind the one talking tousled his hair a little bit. the talker looked more and more nervous as he tried handed me a pamphlet.   "Well, here is something for him, it's just a little book about accepting Jesus. I know there's a lot of turmoil in our lives and a lot of people are wondering why God is letting that happen. Also..." i saw him start to open his bible, to the book of revelations, of course. i accidently sighed. "...there's a scripture passage here that...." i interrupted.   "Actually, I'm not interested." i felt a little bad. for the talker, the other guy just looked on in amazement.   "Oh!" the little girl disappeared behind the legs of the talker. "Do you have any beliefs? I mean, what do you believe in?" i didn't want to get into logistics, so i took the easy way out.   "I'm an atheist." i'm not really, i don't really know what i am. but i hoped that was enough to get them back on their way. i felt kind of bad, but the look that the man behind the talker gave me a wide-eyed appalled look as if he couldn't believe that i'm refusing to read the bible with them, which helped in diminishing my guilt. i continued, "but thanks, though." for nothing, i didn't say.   "Okay..." he might have mumbled something, but i closed the door pretty quickly and locked the door. hopefully they won't be back to try and do some more convincing.   i mean, with the amounts of telemarketers calling my house and the frequent visits from religious army recruiters, my patience has dwindled considerably.   and considerably is putting it politely.

sometimes i find myself at the record store, for no apparent reason and i don't remember even going there. it's like i'm leonard - "Okay, so what am I doing? Oh, I'm chasing this guy. [Dodd stops, pulls out a gun and points it at Leonard.] No... he's chasing me." i found myself in sonic boom today and i picked up a copy of the woke up falling record (on accident), i was in the record store and picked a pair of headphones and put them on my head. i hit disc 3, looking at the cd on the rack. i listened to the first song, for a few seconds and hit the skip button. next song, about 5 more seconds. next song, and then i take the headphones off, set them on top of the cd player (with the cd in my hands), and before i know it, i'm at the front paying for it. my mind plays dirty tricks on me sometimes. have a listen, it'll sound familiar. and because i love you, i put up something else here today. if you don't watch the brak show, you should. right now, even.

two things: (1) watched series 7 last night, and aside from the girls vs. boys soundtrack, i thought the movie was pretty shitty. the camera work was intentionally atrocious, trying to capture that "reality tv" feel, but looked more like someone just got a hold of dad's video camera. the film didn't come off as clever or even scathing (which is kind of a surprise). it just came off as a really, really bad reality tv show, where the actors trying to pretend they weren't actors couldn't even do that. (2) what the hell happened to bipolar?

  i had a dream last night: i was in a conference room of some sort, and a guy i see everyone once in a while here in seatle was there, and i also went to highschool with him. in fact, he and i share the same birthday. well, we were standing at the front of the room, we're just talking and he has a set of sewing needles with him. i think nothing of it, until he says, "i dare you to put one of these in your mouth." no hesitation.   "okay." i open my mouth and he drops one in. it floats in my mouth for a while and i feel it migrating to the right side of my jaw and down my throat. i am able to cough it up a little, and it comes out. i start to chew for some reason, and there is another needle in my mouth. i can feel dozens of them in there now. i panic a little, and ask him, "how many did you put in there?"   "just one." he says nervously, obviously lying. i continue to fish the needles out of my mouth but i can feel them poking through my skin and through my teeth. i leave him there, and head towards the bathroom.   at this point i can feel them working their way through my jaw. looking in the mirror, i can see them poking through my skin. i start pulling them out by pushing on the skin and grabbing them on the other end inside my mouth. this works for a while until the needles turn into nails, and i have to start yanking them through. all this, remarkably, with little pain.   i wonder a bit about the absence of sensation as i pull the nails out, and i marvel at how being painless is so fucking horrifying.   a second later, i wake up.

when i wake up in the morning, i look out my window to the right of my bed and stick my finger through the shades. i pull down a little to see what the weather is like, and more often than not, it's overcast. i stare down at my feet towards the clock, trying to see what time it is, but can't make it out, because i don't have my glasses on yet. the minute i put on my glasses, everything comes into focus again and i can only think of getting out of bed. overcast weather is just so middle-of-the-road. sometimes, i need a little something to set the tone for the day. push me a little this way or that. i have to say that monk is responsible for making me lazy and skipping out on school today. no worries, though. it's just that kind of day.

my favorite 3 parts of everynight fire works are: (1) the polaroid snapshot sounds in a-list actress right after bob says, "come and take a picture." (2) in what you're up against, when the overdubs kick in right after "time in" and bob sings "breathe in" and "breath out" right after "time out" so the words fall right in between spoken breaths. (3) the odd time signature, syncopated drumming, and (i guess this one counts as three) the single bent note that slams in and fades out of let's go blue right at the 4:02 mark. if i ever get pulled over while listening to this album, i'm going to make the fuzz listen to the music, and ask him if he'd be able to drive slow while listening to it.

i'm not sure how long they've been running this feature, but the nytimes has been taking a dozen or so people in the industry and interviewing them about the films they picked. here's wes anderson's pick: From Truffaut's Centimes, a Wealth of Inspiration

because missy's is entertaining, why can't mine be? my friday five: 1. What was your first job? when i was 16, i started working at little caesar's pizza in richland. brandon basically got me the job, 'cause he used to work there. dustin, the manager was there, and said to brandon, "is he good?" i was standing right in front of them. it was funny. i turned out to be a better worker than brandon, whom the district manager wanted to fire because he asked brandon how he knew when the pizza was done. brandon looked at him straight-faced and said: "how am i supposed to know?" 2. How old were you when you had your first kiss? yikes. sometime between the ages of 12-14. i'm not exactly sure, but it was a dare, and it was only on the cheek, at a party. does that count? 3. What was your first car? What happened to it? my first car was a 525 (i think) bmw. i think it was a 1985 make, and it was a terribly poor car. the seats had no backs on them, and the passenger side was held up by a skateboard deck. it was my brother's before me, and my dad's before that. josh cracked the windshield once when he jumped on it, and andre segura ripped off the door handle as he was getting in. right now, i think it's in rohnert park in some guy's yard who is supposedly fixing it. i think it's been there for about a year. 4. What was your first concert? sebadoh and those bastard souls at WSU when i was 16 (i think). 5. How do you plan to spend your weekend? birthday party, oil change, html school work, and general laziness. as usual.

in high school, i remember driving with my brother in his car, having freshly arrived in richland, washington and hating it before my feet even hit the pavement after i got out of the plane. he was listening to some tape some girl had given him, and i listened too. i'd later find out that he had identified with the song, and little did i know that that would be my first introduction to northwest music. the lyrics to neil's down went something like "i hate it here, gotta go somewhere else. i loved it there..." and i think it was kind of funny at the time. it's strange to think that i was already laughing at that hyperbole that richland seemed to squeeze out of its inhabitants. perhaps it's this mutual dissatisfaction with the place that enabled me to make the friends i did. a year or so later, i remember being in a car, hearing the song car, and thinking (and maybe even saying aloud), "this is the treepeople." i was corrected and whoever was with me made me feel stupid about it, which i already did. that was probably about 8 years ago now, and i still feel like the theme song for that time is car. but i still remember driving that night with my brother. the best thing about richland is how warm it is at night, and how you can drive with the windows down and not be too cold or too hot, and how the air is sweeter and fresher and the sky is clearer - brighter with stars and dimmer with black. if nothing else, that alone was enough to remunerate for my uprooting from northern california. at one point i thought i might write something about it all, but when i got to seattle, i found someone already had. thanks, rocky.

i almost put the first song off this record on here, but decided against it, because i think i like darling, applaud better. i remember seeing camden in bellingham in the dimly lit basement of the 20th century bowl, with dozens of kids crowded around the band. it wasn't tight, because the area was so expansive, but it was cozy. the p.a. being used wasn't top notch, but watching them, the singer cupping his hands around the mic to compress the sound and increase his volume - it was an amazing thing.

i know, i know. i don't know why i'm still up, but i am. for some reason, i think that el scorcho is one of my favorite videos, despite it's relative plain-ness. that version is a big one. you can find smaller ones at weezer.net. also, i remember seeing this video a few weeks before christmas, and i regret not having said anything earlier, but it's a little late now. it's a fun video to watch if you've ever been to or live in seattle. and i also think sean has a great voice. here it is: sometimes you have to work on xmas by harvey danger. that's a big one, too - smaller ones at the site.

i'm back, but i'm still not ready to start making updates. but i guess this is an update anyway. i have no offerings of best of lists, music or otherwise, but i do have to say that the royal tenenbaums and lord of the rings where some of the best movies of last year. by and by, happy new year.

oddly enough, it took me a little while to get into my account, because for some reason, the password's changed on it. anyways, i forgot to mention that i'm out of state until sunday, which means i'm without a decent internet connection. come sunday, however, the chatter should continue as usual. have a good christmas.

colder than usual. i've had trouble keeping the temperature control in the house. when i'm too cold, i turn on the heater, and it gets too hot for me two minutes later. the weekend is almost over. listening to the nova scotia album that came out a few years ago - the circular ruins. also on clear vinyl, available here. the album is full of ebbs and swells, long one-note non-progressions and snappy drums. a bit bare in some parts due to a little lacking in production value, despite the "lush" tag it's given in the the one-liner. lonesome is right, though. dark, empty rooms would like it.

it's raining here again. sometimes, when it gets late, all i can listen to is something quiet, just someone and a guitar. there are a few exceptions. (1) being the spinanes' second album, strand, and the other being the weakerthans' left and leaving, specifically, this is a fire door, never leave open. it doesn't matter if the guitars are loud, and the drums pound, because i can just relax when i hear that part where everything breaks, and you hear the snare hit 8 times as he sings right over it, and everything just comes back in. and then listening to everything that he has to say and how he says it so well. ambivalence is a beautiful thing.

i think that perhaps i could just write about the weather here everyday. today was cold and wet. my feet were wet, and i walked around the u-district. it was cold and wet. and then later, it was colder.

it's sunny here in seattle. sunny, albeit a bit hazy now, but this morning, it was bright and the skies were blue. the shades in my room weren't exactly open, but the light still came in. it's cold, too. cold and sunny is my favorite, and lazy sunday afternoons feel good, even if i'm not in new york, and even if it's not autumn anymore.

i'm back. i took the site down for a short while for a few reasons. (1) being that i didn't enjoy writing on here as much, and wanting to refocus a bit on writing for myself, rather than other people (2) being that i could not get the re-design finished, and i was sick of looking at the other page. this design wasn't what i intended, but it'll do for now. today, there's a secret stars cover by death cab for cutie up there by the picture. it was on an old 7" single of prove my hypotheses that i got a while ago, and the song is great. you can hear the evolution of chris's recording style, and you can learn up on old favorites, secret stars. the best part is the drums at the onset, with the pang! ben plays the drums on the song i think, and you can kinda tell, because he's like a robot. it's very much in stride with the sound of we have the facts.... find it somewhere and get the record, because it's on clear vinyl. clear vinyl is cool. if you can't find it, you can probably get it from jason at sonic boom.

the best? the best is when you actually feel like your brain works.

the other night i had this dream where i was standing on a stage with a room full of people. i was dancing around, not knowing what exactly i was dancing to, until, from the back of the room the doors burst open and someone came out. perhaps i was expecting a ton of people to come out of the door, because i was surprised, but only one person came out and was flying through the doors and running through the seats with her arms spread wide as if she were flying. at that point, i realize what song is on, and it's that stupid madonna song on the those goddamned windows xp commercials. i woke up, and the song was still in my head.

the rat cat hogan show tonight was great, although it kept me up late. see? i am still up. what? you didn't know there was a show tonight? sorry. short notice and all, but it was worth it. there were quite a few acts, actually, and all were pretty good. herbert scared me when he asked if i was playing tonight, and that i should play something should there be time. thankfully, there was not. even rch's set was super short, but it was still worth it. rosie thomas played, and did a little comic act, too, which was pretty funny. her voice is unbelievable - she's collaborated w/ damien jurado on ghost of david and the bruce springsteen tribute badlands. sean nelson and some of his other harvey danger compatriots played, as well as the long winters, whom are coming out with an album in january. stuff sounded good. they're playing saturday, too at the croc with the actual tigers and the dear john letters (which are damn good, too - feat. robb benson of nevada bachelors. you can hear them on mp3.com. the later i stay up, the more i want to write. if i had no job, no school, and no life, perhaps i would write more. but, what really would i write about? i would keep a watchful eye on the youths of america from my window, making sure they don't tip over the neighbor's motorcycle, even though he suspects us of tipping it over and he rides down the street on his bike blasting sugar ray and his roommate/relative/whateverthefuck-he-is drives a white camaro. support you local scene!

i think the single most gracious and sincere act i've encountered from a customer was yesterday, when a patron at the the theater looked at the 5 employees standing at the ush stand and said, "thanks everyone, for being here today, away from your families so that we could see a movie." today was my last day at the metro.

what will happen in the morning, when the world it gets so crowded that you can't look out the window in the morning?: jettas can take sharp corners at 35 mph. on damp streets. especially in kirkland. as if to remind me that i am not in charge of other people's driving, no matter how much i would like to be, nor how much my berating them feels like it does. nor does it guarantee that my doing so will change anything. on my way to ali's, i drove up a hill. a van followed, much more closely than i appreciate. going the speed limit is just not enough for more than half the people on the streets these days. as i made my way up the hill, the lights began to bother me, so i flicked the rear view mirror switch, which gets their lights out of my eyes. my recurring headache just wasn't too keen on having bright lights shined in my eyes. as i approached the first stop sign at the end of the hill i flicked the switch back, to make sure the guy wasn't following to closely. without looking exactly at the stop sign, i hit the brakes a bit abruptly, a little before the actual stop. i moved up a little, and proceeded through it. at the next stop sign, i hit the brakes rather sharply again. partly because i couldn't really tell where the stop sign was, partly because i wanted the person behind me to be alert to the fact that i didn't want to be tailed. this didn't bode well with our friend in the red minivan. i turned, he turned. he tailed more closely, and switched on his brights. at this point, i wonder if he is old or young. i drive through the neighborhood, and pass ali's house, because i don't want to stop. i know this guy is pissed. i get to stop sign, and i turn right. i drive a block and stop at another stop sign. the van pulls up beside me, and i try to move forward. he pulls forward too, so that i can't turn. i roll my window down. as cooly and calmly as i can manage, i ask, "do you need something?" the guy gets out of his car and starts marching toward me. he looks about 35, a buzz cut and grayish on the sides. he's got the glasses that are square and shiny metal frames, with the bridge over the top of them, and he walks like he's straddling a motorcycle. i can feel his footsteps stamp into the wet concrete as he yells. "you want your ass kicked motherfucker?!" my window is open and he tries to grab at it. i reacted more quickly than i could have imagined, and i saw his hands slip on the back window as i peeled out on the wet pavement and rocketed down the street. i shot over two speed bumps at 45 mph, slowed down and took a sharp left onto a bigger street. i drove down the street a ways, not thinking about where i was going to go, but knowing i was going there fast. i took another left into a side street. i knew it was a dead end, but i pulled in anyway, quickly glancing behind me to see if he had had enough time to get back to his car and give chase. i didn't see the van. i pulled into someone's driveway, turned off all my lights and waited for a moment, blood pulsing through my veins and my heart racing. filled with adrenaline and fear, i could feel my hands shaking. i can still feel it a little, imagining myself sitting there in the dark. i looked in my rear view mirror and planned another escape in case he happened to pull into the court. nothing. i pull out of the driveway and drive around the neighborhood. nothing. finally after wandering the streets in my car, i get my bearings straight and head back to ali's. shaken, but smiling. i don't know why i was smiling. perhaps it was out of fear. i couldn't tell if the man was drunk or it was just that he was livid, but i was worried that he'd come back around looking for trouble. i still can't help but feel like i should have yelled "fuck you!" at him or at least flipped him off, but i do feel the better man for the lack of having done so. i didn't call the cops. i felt a little sorry for him, and wondered if that would be me someday, threatening kids on thanksgiving because they won't let me tailgate them. then i felt angry that he felt the need to ruin my thanksgiving. i assumed that he probably has a terrible life, or if he did not, that he would soon; because he's on the karma payment plan. after my diatribe the other day, i take solace in the fact that karma is indeed, a bitch.

happy thanksgiving, everyone.

boy what a load of horsecrap. it's probably all a matter of what i've been listening to and when. there are few absolutes when opinionating, and perhaps in a few years, i can take all that back. 5 years ago, i probably wouldn't have liked the stuff that i like now, and 5 years from now, i probably will like something different. but there has to be some sort of constant in there, and perhaps on my deathbed, i'll think about the bands that have constantly remained in my "good" category. that's a little morbid.

a while ago, perhaps it was a few years ago, i sat around a table with a few of my friends somewhere. i'm not sure where, but most likely stella's (where we're usually gathered at night, because it's the only alternative to ihop and denny's in the u-district). i think we started talking about contemporary bands that lose it after a few albums (i think 3 was the key number) save for a few exceptions. my contention was that built to spill and superchunk were those exceptions. i'm sure a number of other bands could easily fit the bill, but for the sake of (my) argument, let's ignore them. it came to my attention that built to spill may have lost that exception. built to spill, released 7(?) albums, one of which is a compilation of older tracks, one a live album. they also released a handful of eps, (5 or so, i believe). at the fourth album (perfect from now on, unless you don't count the normal years, which would make it the third, but i will since the songs were probably written and recorded before pfno), in my opinion, they hit their stride. keep it like a secret was a good album, and felt like it was squeezing out the genius left over from pfno (you can hear left over influences from that album, longer songs and more complex song structures. the guitar sound even bleeds into the first track of the halo benders' album the rebel's not in.) ancient melodies..., though, is getting a little boring. fine, fine, bring in sam coomes again, have some guitar hooks and self-indulgent solos. that's all fine. but the type of epic madness and exploration, the frustration and energy that's gone into perfect..., that's the kind of hard working doug we know. i can't help but think that the static line-up has something to do with it, or that warner bros., has made him lazier, but i feel like the train is slowing to a stop. now, this does not at all change the fact that they are indeed a good fucking band. now, you see, i had to use an expletive, because i really think they are that good. and i'm not saying that the album is devoid of good songs. i happen to love strange and a couple of other songs on the album, but i do believe that this has put them in my frame of mind, into a strange predicament. i have not, as of yet, seen a band that has collapsed into drudgery and become stagnate be able to uproot itself out of that (although if i thought hard enough, i probably could say i have). what the hell, this is all arbitrary anyway. i haven't yet been able to get a copy of here's to shutting up, so i can't inflict my opinion of that upon you.

part of my new found problem with driving is the placeless anger i have with other drivers. i'm frustrated with the frustration that i experience whenever i see someone else out there driving like a maniac. i'm sure that half the dirvers out there don't deserve the tirades that i give but i continue regardless. i am guilty myself of perpretating the kinds of evils that i condemn on the roads, hell, just last night i almost got into an accident near my house because i didn't see a car coming around the corner. and this is what i mean. last night, i could only fault the other driver, thinking that they were driving too fast in the dark and rainy night so that i couldn't really even see them. kind of funny how that works. i finished a personal matter, and am starting to read the book of laughter and forgetting again. the former struck me with much more force than the first time i read it, maybe because i was paying more attention this time around. eventually i'll get around to telling you what i really thought about it, hopefully before my opinion fades, as most of mine do unless they have reason to continually reoccur in my life. team rocket is so funny.

sometimes during winter in seattle, we go through long day after long day of darkness. i mean, the sun comes up, sure. it's nothing like alaska, where it's dark for weeks at a time. but to wake up, look outside, and see the light only fall upon things with a thin mask of illumination and never shine like it does in the summer, it's strange. strange in the same manner when you wake up at 6 at night, after having taken a nap at 4, and you sleep longer than you had planned. you wake up at 6, and look outside and it's dark already, and you can't tell if you slept through the entire night, or only slept for a couple of hours. and that grey is just so staid, everything is simply so unexcited that you can barely get yourself to move in the morning, or in the middle of the day, or around 430, when it starts to get dark and you know you have to get something to eat or you'll die of starvation because you haven't had anything to eat all day. but even then, it's stoic, because you could still not move. you could just sleep. but thank goodness there's rain, because it's cold. shivering cold. walking in it with everyone else, getting wet and feeling ambivalent about it, glad that it gets you to move, but not so much that it's making you wet and uncomfortable. but no, i like rain, it gives me an excuse to look out the window and watch the raindrops race each other down the glass. this morning, i was driving to school and i laid on my horn for a while. james yelled at me, "don't do that!" while i sat astonished at the incomparable idiocy of the driver in front of me. when i'm in cars with other people now, i can't help but tell them the "right" way to go. i can't just sit calmly and watch the people around me drive and not use their turn signals, or when i let them into my lane and don't give me a wave. i swear and curse at them, audibly, and i enunciate, so that if they happen to see me in their rear view mirror, they can see my mouth moving: "fu-ck-ing di-ck-head" or "ass-hole" i see them haul ass and weave through traffic, and wish to myself that there's a cop right around the corner to pull them over and give them a ticket, haul them off to jail, or give them a cavity search. and i sit and listen to john in the morning play king of all of the world and i watch the rain fall in buckets onto cracked streets and long stretches of jet black highway. i run my windshield wipers which have not one decent speed in mild rain, and i dodge rainbow filled puddles in potholes and yell at crazy drivers and see them zoom down empty freeways and at least once, every time i'm in the car, i wish i wasn't driving, i wish i had just stayed at home. i missed the price is right.

at certain times of the day, when the mood is right (or absolutely wrong, depending on the situation), it is amazing how 3 minutes can change your perception. this morning, death cab came to the rescue during a grouchy 4 hours of sleep morning. it's the best when you're driving, and something comes on that you didn't expect to hear on the radio, and it brings you somewhere you didn't expect to go. too bad that turn wasn't permanent. stupid traffic.

okay, so i never got around to giving a favorite moments of whatever the hell i said. i got around to thinking about it and how dumb an idea it was. or maybe i'm just lazy. but no! i'm not lazy, as i have worked a lot in the past week, and wrote a paper last night which came to its culmination during the wee hours of this morning. at around 4 i finally put myself (and my paper) to rest. i started out thinking that the paper was pretty good, but lost that illusion later in the evening. tonight, my only day off of the week, is time to relax. oh, and thps3 is great, aside from all the whining sissies online that can't take the heat and ban you from their games, because they think you're cheating (boo cheaters!). that is the nerdiest part of a post i've contributed in a long time. i think. i'm still having the damndest time replying to emails. boo me.

i just realized that when i was working at amazon, harry potter was the scourge that wore away at my nerves. now that i'm at the theater, it's following me. this weekend is going to be insane.

i never wanna say my best days are behind me. i never wanna be lukewarm. oh yes, happy berfday dear blog. it's been quite a year, hasn't it? perhaps later i'll give a (overly egotistical and self-referential) favorite moments of blogdom, in hoping there will be more to come. friday night, we all saw better off dead at the midnight showing at the egyptian. i love that movie. Now that's a real shame when folks be throwin' away a perfectly good white boy like that. today, it's off to play tony hawk pro skater 3 at jason's, in hopes to satiate that desire.

just watched traffic. steven soderbergh never fails to amaze me. taking on the cinematography duties was quite a step - the cinematography wasn't top notch, but it was distinct, which makes it better than the cinematography in more than half the films out there. and it wasn't just the clever (and blatantly simplistic) use of filters over the settings, or the constant use of handheld cameras, or the effective use of linear cuts (like at the beginning, where it looked like a documentary). wait. that's not true. it was just that stuff. yup. i do, however, hate catherine zeta-jones.

i just made a fool out of myself during a presentation today. i wasn't prepared, and you'd think since you were an undergraduate in a graduate class, you'd work a little harder on your presentation so that people wouldn't think you were stupid, but i didn't think that way. incidentally, i didn't think at all. but maybe, since i am an undergraduate, people wouldn't think anything of it. sadly, that's probably the truth. did you see buffy last night? that was ridiculous(ly funny)! also, here's to hoping smallville will come up with a new formula sometime. i mean, formulas are good, but they're mostly kitsch. for example. as you can tell, i've been watching a lot of upn lately. it's not so bad, really, it's just the midday grind that sucks the life out of me - nothing on but court tv shows, jerry springer-esque shite, and soapy operas. i was reading a copy of cinescape yesterday, which came in the mail addressed to the people that used to live at my house and i decided that not only do i need to watch more tv, i also need to read more comic books. exciting stuff going on in comic land soon: revealing the origin of wolverine, the return of the dark night, and movie development for the daredevil and the incredible hulk (although the star for daredevil is a bit questionable - vin diesel?! i mean, pitch black was great, but the fast and the furious?). oh yes, and for those that are concerned, i won't be dropped out of school this quarter because of lack of funds, which puts me on he right track towards graduation. hope you're all having a good day (unless you're mean and i hate you, in which case, i hope you get hit by a truck).

got some movies from netflix.com, but haven't watched them yet. just figured out that their 2 week trial period is a scam, because it takes them a week to get the movies to you. still, it's 3 free movie rentals. alphaville, kikujiro, and traffic. i've seen kikujiro, but not the other two films. now the only thing i need to do is find the time to watch them. i also saw battle royale a while ago, which was absolutely insane. it didn't help that i had too much pizza to eat and 2 minutes before the film was over, had to rush to the bathroom and throw up because my stomach hurt so bad. unbelievable, nonetheless. (unbelievable, however, in that way of astonishment, the film wasn't terribly profound but it was fun to watch in awe - see it, and you'll understand why). i was thinking today how much damned time i spend on the internet (although you people out there wouldn't really notice, since i hardly post here as often as i'd like) and how much time i spend not doing the things i intend to do (i.e., nihongo benkyosuru tsumori des, kedo kawari ni benkyosuru, boku wa eiga miru to internet asobiru) and thought that i might as well have cable and tivo and whatnot, since i'm not doing what i'm supposed to be doing, and it's unfair for the internet to monopolize all my free time. dammit, there's adult swim and dexter's lab to be watched!

i've been spending the last few days trying to construct a page in css, with not much luck. also, i've been (re)discovering the wonders of bearshare (with just as little luck, as far as good music is concerned). i worked tonight at the metro, and it was hellish. pushing popcorn to eager movie goers trying to push past the line so they can get good seats to monsters inc. i saw it on thursday night during a screening, and it creeped into the wee hours of the morning. i woke up early today to go take a japanese test, sleep lazing in my eyes, and couldn't remember half of what i had learned the night before (again, at work, studying). but apparently i can't emphasize enough (or i tend to emphasize too much) that japanese isn't my strong suit. so things are getting busier than i had ever imagined they would right about now. there's a million things i want to get done, but very little that i actually do. it's always been that way, hasn't it?

earlier today i got stuck on a computer that was teasing me. i would click on something, and it would work for aobut 2 seconds, and then the computer would slow down and would take a couple minutes to finish the process. i planned on posting, but by the time i was done with my homework, i had to go to class. i wondered if anyone would notice that i had just hucked the fucker out the window, and walked to a different computer. happy halloween, by the way. we were at the store a couple days ago, and my roommates and i decided that instead of grocery shopping for candy to give to kids today, we would only spend money on stuff we wanted to eat. so tonight, we plan on using the "lights out" method and closing the gate in front of our house. if that doesn't work, i'll throw candy corns at the kids from my window and yell at them to go the hell home. i love halloween.

although halloween hasn't officially come and gone, we did have a party saturday night that was pretty successful. i was a fairy (funny). we put on cheesy (and disgusting) movies on the tv, and you'd know when something really bad was going to happen, because jason (who owned the movies), would stand up and walk out of the room (apparently fearing that someone would make the connection that the owner of these said films was him). i on the other hand, knew what was going on. re-animator was one of the films. started reading kenzaburo oe's a personal matter again, and also started reading a little more about borges and Funes, the Memorius and c.s. peirce's work on prescinding. fascinating stuff, really. i'd tell you more about it, but i have to go to class. maybe later.

nov. 11th, and the weblog will be 1 year old. 1 year is a long time for anything.

apparently, an electric space heater takes as much power as 40 flourescent lamps. i had my test today, which went okay, aside from me cracking jokes in japanese that my teacher didn't think were very funny. in fact, they aren't especially in english. the whole point is that they're in japanese. i think they're only funny to those that are learning, because it's fun to do that when you're learning a language. otherwise, it's equivalent to someone that doesn't know english very well cracking a dumb joke in english, and you not laughing, because it's not funny, it's just stupid. in conclusion, my joke was not funny, but stupid. very very stupid (stupid = baka in japanese).

oh, but better yet: dexter, didi, and mandark.

thanks everyone (both of you) for your suggestions. i will put them in a random lottery, and pick the winner out of a hat. just kidding. i don't know if i have the resources (or energy) to do some ot he costumes, although the suggestions are quite good. i have a lot of school work that i've put off for this week, including an oral test (very funny) for japanese that i have tomorrow, but haven't started practicing for yet. we have to still write a script, and my partner didn't show up to class today (i didn't show up to lecture yesterday, but that's beside the point). i also have quite a few other things to do, and yesterday i won tickets from kexp to go to don byron playing at the earshot jazz festival on friday. my favorite suggestion thus far: the powerpuff girls.

oh yeah - happy birthday, al.

meant to update much earlier, but got sidetracked looking at some graduate schools. i registered for graduation, and if all goes well, i should be done in june with two degrees under my belt - one in comparative literature and one in cinema studies. i came upon a slew of posts that i had done a few months ago and wished i only had the time and energy to think of stuff as entertaining as i thought it was back then. unfortunately, the only thing i could think of to post was an unending trail of complaints about having nothing to post about. in any case, i still believe that writing anything is better than writing nothing just because you have nothing to write about. i'm not sure if you out there are all better off because of it, in fact, i sincerely doubt it. if anything else, this page has grown into a forum for me to complain about everything, mostly about my peers and drivers, though. halloween is soon, how about that? anyone have any good ideas for a costume? please help! my roommates and i shallowly entertained the idea of being the a-team, although if we so chose to, we would probably have to endure an unending stream of the question, "what are you?"

Tim rocks, too. but you all already knew that. (i was really only invited to this club so i could post updates about our trip when Tim didn't want to. i hope i don't get in trouble. maybe you should all send emails saying how content you are knowing that a girl is being included in the posting power. but maybe only boys read this and you don't want to be troubled by girls anymore than you undoubtedly already are. (and i mean that in only the most understanding way.) in that case, take solace in the fact that i really only wanted to say that Tim rocks. seriously, have you seen his rock jumps?)

by the way, my girlfriend rocks.

i remember andrew posting his top places (according to a computer) to live a while ago, and i promised myself i'd do the same (for my own reference). i took the test, but don't remember the results. i think the number one place was either somewhere in rhode island or connecticut, and portland, or was in my top 10, too. you can do it youself at findyourspot.com, and here are my new results (which seem to be almost identical to last time):

1. hartford, connecticut - looks nice from the pictures, but the "insurance capital of the world"? east coast drivers also drive me nuts, but i don't think that would really affect my judgement. i mean - it's just driving, right?
2. portland, or - is alright, if you're into that. i've always been creeped out by the city, although i do know a lot of very nice people there. it's just that when you cross the burnside bridge... also, the church of elvis is there.
3. providence, rhode island - 41 miles to boston and smaller than the other cities so far on the list. it looks inviting, though if the town providence is anything like the show, no thank you. lowest crime rate in the northeast, and the cheapest place to live in New England ain't bad, either.
4. new haven, connecticut - first two sentences included "Yale University", "first settlement" and "group of puritans." cost of living is 22% above national average. next.
5. boston, massacusetts - population capping 3 million, m.i.t. and boston harbor. rent is probably expensive, and i'm not will hunting.
6. baltimore, maryland - only the second place on this list that i've actually been to. being there and driving wasn't as great as i remember, but i did have a good time down by the harbor. cheap place to live, too. turns out, it's probably one of the most likely (out of the top 6) places i'll end up living in the next year.
7. eugene, or - i've driven through the town, i think i actually tried to get something to eat there, and all i remember was how many porn stores there were. for some reason, i've never really been thrilled with the idea of living anywhere in oregon (see #2).
8. danbury, connecticut - where? avg. household income $80,000 (which doesn't mean much to me, because there's probably no way i'll make that much, it just means i'd be living near people that did).
9. corvallis, or - see #7
10. chicago, il - i still don't know why chicago has this mecca-like quality for me, but my short visit there this summer confirmed it. as far as i'm concerned, this should be number 1, and actually is as far as the liklihood of where i'll be moving. home of the first ferris wheel, you know. cost of living is only 9% above the national average, and unemployment is below the national average as well. yep. i wish i could say something bad about it - oh yeah, traffic sucked.
11. charleston, west virginia - smallest population on the list, 53K. average two bedroom apartment costs less than $500 per month though. a little inland for my taste.
12. milwaukee, wisconsin - 19th largest city in the nation, 140 county parks, and 14,000 acres for camping. 80% less crime than chicago, and housing is cheaper too. hmm. interesting.

other cities included: salem - OR, albuquerque - NM (boo!), frederick - MD, sheboygan - WI, medford - OR, little rock - AR (what?), honolulu - HI (nice), worcester - MA, bend - OR, madison - WI, eau claire - WI, champaign/urbana - IL

i hate the library. people are always in the library, talking on their cell phones, inflicting their hideously annoying rings on everyone else whilst being absolutely oblivious and inconsiderate. i noticed that i never use the "insert" key on my keyboard and would like to start doing so more often. i was in a movie a while ago - you'll probably never see it, but tonight there's a screening and maybe it'll be okay. i listened to the some of the hey mercedes songs at everynightfireworks.com and couldn't stop. i only listened to "haven't been this happy" 5 times or so within the past few days, and now i woke up this morning with it in my head. the thing is, i'd talk mike out of quitting if i didn't feel the same exact way. paul seems to be in the same boat and scott didn't even give me a chance to try. regardless of whether or not these guys will continue posting (myself included), i'd like to think that (and take solace in this thought) we've all connected in some distinct manner through this garbled mess of wires and worlds.