detroit has a skyline too

Today I went to see Crash. I wanted to make a "joke" about this, but I couldn't come up with anything good. I was going to pretend that I went into it blindly thinking that it was a biopic about Lawrence 'Crash' Davis, who was fictionalized for the classic baseball movie Bull Durham. Either that, or that I thought it was a redux of David Cronenberg's film of the same name. I never saw the Cronenberg movie, but I know for sure that it wasn't a redux. Actually, the only thing I know about the Cronenberg vehicle is that there was a shitload of really graphic sex scenes.

A little bit of incidental information about "Crash" Davis. The real Crash Davis was a shortstop/2nd baseman who played three partial seasons in the Major Leagues, and never hit more than a couple of homers. Costner's character spoke of going to "the show" for just a few games. He was a catcher who hit a boatload of home runs.

Enough aboat that

I was actually a bit miffed because there weren't any previews. None. There were a shitpot of Coca-cola commercials, but no previews. I'm not going to give a long movie review or anything like that. I don't want to spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it. And if you haven't, you should. That is, if you like movies. I was recently handed brickbats for not giving a "spoiler warning" about a SFU episode, so I'll completely refrain from giving spoilers here. Save this: Jennifer Esposito is an attractive woman.

At some point in the near future, I'll see Batman Begins, but probably not until next week.

now playing:

Andrew Bird's Bowl of Fire Andrew Bird & The Mysterious Production of Eggs

that looks like a carnival wig and two shiners

When I came home from work last night, I saw something that I didn't really want to see. One of my upstairs neighbors was clearly visible through her bedroom window. The light was on, blinds open. She was buck-ass naked. Now, as much as I appreciate the female form, that doesn't mean that I wanted to see her naked. I didn't stand there and observe, but as I approached the house from my car, I was kinda shocked. My knee-jerk reaction was of course "hey..... boobs!", followed by "what the hell?", followed by "yikes! I wish I hadn't seen that". I don't know what she was thinking parading around like that, but I really wish I didn't see that.

I got around to watching some more of those Twilight Zone episodes I had TiVo'ed.
Some of them were really good. Some of them, not so much. One of the "not so good" episodes was about a dude who has a radio that was receiving live broadcasts from 20 years in the past. Seems innocuous enough, but it looked like absolute hell. I guessed that it was filmed live or something like that. Kind of, but not really. It was one of a small handful of Twilight Zone episodes that was filmed on videotape rather than film. Video editing wasn't really possible in the early 60's so it had to be done in longer takes than it would on film. I guess they were experimenting with the new cheap way to film stuff. If the producers could go back in time, I'm sure they wouldn't use video. In the batch of good ones, there were two different episodes dealing with time travel which starred Russell Johnson (The Professor from Gilligan's Island). Although their original air dates were a couple of years apart, they were aired back-to-back in the marathon. I thought that was a bit odd. The Professor was, for a short period of time, the coach of my fantasy baseball team. He didn't do so well.

Speaking of my fantasy baseball team, I'd like to take back all the dirty things I said about them. They pulled out another impressive victory last week, pulling us into a tie for last place. They actually deserve a little bit of praise.

It's about time to go watch Six Feet Under.

now playing:

Tsunami The Heart's Tremolo

sweeter than a drop of blood from a sugarcube

Amid the bad news of the day was some damn good news. Even if the stories surrounding it are conflicting, I still think it's good news. Apparently, the NHL and the NHLPA are very close to a deal. Some reports indicate that they have already agreed in principle, and that they just need to draw up the particulars and get all the John Hancocks. The League and the PA both deny that the deal is imminent, but continue to indicate that things are going very well. Anyway, the rumors are that the new CBA should be signed early next week.
Be ware that this is unconfirmed, but the details from several different sources indicate that the player salaries will be rolled back 24% across the board. This is in-line with an offer they made a long time ago. Also, there would be a "team-by-team floating salary cap" maxing out at 37 million. I have no idea what differentiates a "floating salary cap" from, say, a "soft salary cap". Also in the alleged deal is that no player may earn more than 20% of his team's total payroll. Additionally (here's the part I like), 15% of every player's paycheck will go into an escrow account. If, when the season is over, league-wide player salaries come out to 54% or less of total league revenues, the money in escrow reverts to the players. If players' salary spending comes to more than 54% of revenues, then then the League gets to keep and evenly disburse the funds to the teams.

Also, it looks like there will be no all-star game next season. They've decided to make an 18-day break in the schedule which will enable players to represent their home country in the Winter Olympics.

Here's the part I don't like. Since we didn't play at all this year, there's no way to determine the draft order, unless they use the order that was used for the 2004 draft. The indication is that they'll put all 30 teams in a lottery to determine the order. That way, every team has an equal chance to get the first pick, which will be the young phenom Sidney Crosby, who has been dubbed "The Next One". Should this CBA be signed next week, there would be a turbo draft held via telephone rather than in a public venue. Of course I would prefer that the 'Canes get the first pick, but as long as he goes to an Eastern Conference team, I'll be happy enough to have chances to see him play.

It's very hard for me to temper my optimism with caution. I have to find a way, though.

now playing (again):

Sufjan Stevens Illinois

there's bourbon on the breath of the singer you love so much

Last night was odd. We were slower than a motherfucker because of the weather. Rain, rain, rain. Time was creeping by, and I thought the night would never end. I thought it would never even make it to 11:00 so I could play Bring a Neglected Record to Work. It seemed especially so because this one kid wouldn't shut up. He's obsessed with all these conspiracy theories about September 11. When he was done ranting about that, he started ranting about Martha Stewart. Why he gives a shit about her, I don't know. He kept saying that she was innocent of wrongdoing blah blah blah. Okay, fine if that's what you want to believe, but he kept insisting that she had been accused in the Enron scandal. I tried to correct him "you mean that insider trading thing with the drug company". "Oh, no", he would say "Enron.". Okay, buddy.

I'm sure he's already got some conspiracy theories going about yesterday's awful events in London. I'll have to hear about them, too.

incidentally, we normally fly the flags of England, Ireland, Wales, Scotland, The UK, and of course The US outside our restaurant. There's a series of poles surrounding the upstairs patio, which is where they are. Northern Ireland does have its own flag, but we don't fly one of those. Because of the recent holiday, we had taken all the others down and we're flying 6 US flags. Not even the general manager of the restaurant knew about this, so I don't know what happened to the others. I'm sure the owner had something to do with it.

Okay... now to the good stuff.

Last night, I took several Neglected Records to work and used a complicated method to randomly pick one. The record I was supposed to do was Just for a Day by Slowdive. I started with it, but I got about three songs in, and I realized that although I still love that record, I couldn't possibly listen to it at work. You need to be laying in bed or sitting on the porch with a beer to listen to that record. So I had to abort that mission. I abandoned the complex method of random selection and picked Hearts of Oak by Ted Leo and the Pharmacists. Hell yeah! A damn fine record. Very punk at times, very emo at times. All rawk. There's a lot of death and suicide imagery, which kinda sucks, but it's so much fun to listen to "Where Have All the Rude Boys Gone". Check it out. I actually think that if it was marketed right, the kids would go nuts for the Ted Leo. I like it better that he's not all over the MTV and whatnot, but it's fun and up-tempo without being aggressive. Some of the hooks are awfully damn catchy too. I remember writing a review of this record for a now-defunct website run by a former friend. I gave it high praise when it was brand new, and I'll still praise it two years later. Although I enjoyed it immensely, and I'll give it 4 out of a possible 5 saute pans, I had another agenda. I realized that Sufjan Stevens was patiently waiting his turn. Instead of giving Ted a repeat listen for the sake of a better blog post, I just wanted to listen to Illinois again. I wasn't really able to give it a thorough listen. I haven't been able to do that yet. I'm looking forward to finding little things about that record that I love. In a big-picture kind of way, I'm enjoying it, though.

now playing:

Red House Painters Ocean Beach

they assumed from the lack of prints in the snow that i'd been away for some time

I finally got back out to the ballpark yesterday. It's only the second time I've been out there this year. Dr. A and I went with his girlfriend and one of her many lesbian friends. I don't know what happened, but DA and his girl got in a fight, so he got the beer from his fridge and we sat on my porch drinking for a little while.

I went inside and started watching some of the many episodes of "The Twilight Zone" which I TiVo'd the other day. July 4, the SciFi Channel had a Twilight Zone marathon. Good stuff. I wish they still made shows like that. I mean, they tried to revive it a couple of different times, and they tried to revive "The Outer Limits" , but none of those efforts were to any avail.

I thought I was gonna have to go upstairs again, as the dude up there was ROCO at like 1 am. Before it got out of hand, though, he shut it down of his own volition.

I hate my fantasy baseball team. We're 4-9 in dead last. We just ended an 8-game losing streak, but it doesn't look that good this week. I'm just ready for the season to be over so I can concentrate on fantasy football. This baseball league I'm in is with some friends of mine who all used to work where I work now, plus a bunch of dudes in Michigan and Florida who I've never met. They expanded the league two years ago, and I was invited to join. I'm not really a baseball fan (although I used to be), so I reluctantly joined. I got lucky and had a fantastic team last year which finished in second place out of 12. This year, though, has been an abysmal failure. Yuck.

Okay. Now to the bit about music. I bought the Sufjan Stevens record yesterday, and I like it a lot. As I was listening to it the first go-round, I had a brief IM conversation with Reid. I had not listened to the mp3 for "Come on Feel The Illinoise ...." which he has posted on his site. So I was hearing that song for the first time. All I could think about, was that that song has Badly Drawn Boy written all over it. It's a good thing, in my mind, but it's really creepy how much it sounds like him. Right now, I can't provide you with mp3 files to make an easy comparison, but if you can get your hands on a Badly Drawn Boy record, specifically Have You Fed the Fish?, give it a listen. If you listen to the new Sufjan Stevens song, and listen to some Badly Drawn Boy, you'll probably be able to hear a similarity. Or am I crazy? I wouldn't rule out the "crazy" option.

now playing:

Badly Drawn Boy One Plus One is One

there's my favorite roller coaster ... the one only sissies ride

Today was a day of some nostalgia and sentimental reflection. This, Lucy, is going to require a lot of 'splaining. This first bit anyway.
Please don't pass judgment. Just read and smile and nod. Or whatever. I'll eventually come to a point.
I heard a Clay Aiken song on the radio. Shut up. Just wait for me to make a point. It really made me sad about missing my Hurricanes this year. Now that needs explanation. Since Clay Aiken is a Raleigh native (or near Raleigh, anyway), he came home to sing the National Anthem and to sing a few of his songs at a 'Canes game. As much as I wanted to hate it, it wasn't really all that bad. I know this might rival my "hey, the new Richard Marx doesn't suck!" comment, but it really wasn't that awful. Not that I liked it, just that I didn't hate it. So he sang some songs during the intermissions. My seats are lower level, right next to where the zamboni comes out. That's where he was. Our section got mobbed by teenage girls and their mothers. In a season where we sucked, this was one of about three memorable things. Again, not that I loved his songs, just that it was such a madhouse. So anyway, I'll always think of the 'Canes when I see or hear Clay Aiken. Of course one of the other two memorable events was the sudden and shocking trade of Ronnie Franchise to the dreaded Maple Leafs. Except for the death of a good friend, I've never been so sad. So I was reminded of how sad that made me all because I heard Clay Aiken on the radio.
Later on, I heard "Tiny Dancer" on the same radio, which always makes me think of two things. First, that scene in "Almost Famous". Second is my friend and former co-worker Jayhawk, who used to sing along "Hold me closer, Tony Danza".
Later, as I was driving home, I saw a woman with some serious '80's mall hair. It was rad.

Goddammit. Now I'm mad again. I won't accept "I'm going to a team who has a chance to win the Cup, so I can retire on top" as an explanation. That's horseshit. Ronnie has two Stanley Cup rings from his tenure with the Penguins. He's got all sorts of other hardware, including three Lady Byng (most gentlemanly player) trophies, a King Clancy (leadership on and off the ice) trophy, a Frank J. Selke (forward who best excels in the defensive aspects of the game) trophy, and he's second only to some guy named Gretzky in career assists. Fourth behind some guys named Gretzky, Messier and Howe in career points. I'm just mad that he couldn't retire on our team. He has a home here and wants to live here permanently, so I never could understand the move to the Leafs. He didn't have anything to prove. The Leafs didn't need an old man. We needed him.
Okay, I'll stop now.
Rant over.

Please note that the time when I started this post was 4:32 PM, and that today's date is 07.06.05. At least that's how we do it in America. So it was 7/6/5 4:32.
I think it's cool anyway.

Now playing:

Sufjan Stevens Illinois

it feels more like a hotel every day

I think the downstairs neighbor of areseven has a twin brother who has just moved in upstairs from me. This dude makes so much noise at an impossibly late hour. I had to go up there to pound on his door at 3:15 in the morning. Fortunately, no confrontation was necessary; the knock on the door was enough for him to turn it WAY down. Round about midnight, he was playing some music or watching TV or something and it wasn't that loud, but I could tell it was there. However, when it became really late, and I was actually trying to sleep, he was listening to Korn or some other such crap with a double kick drum, heavy bass, and the Cookie Monster "singing". As you well know, nobody listens to stuff like that with the volume turned low. It was insane. I don't know what this guy was thinking when he said "I think I'll listen to Korn at 3 in the morning. I'm sure none of my neighbors will mind". My stock explanation for this behavior is: Drugs. The kid's gotta be on the drugs.
Anyway, I've been thinking a lot about this new Sufjan Stevens record that Reid keeps talking about. I haven't listened to the mp3, but I'm sure I will love it. I've been wearing the shit out of Seven Swans, which is the only record of his that I own. Yeah. We've all read and heard the same thing about how he wants to make an album for all 50 states. So far there's just Michigan and now Illinois. The Mountain Goats were gonna do a similar project, naming an album for each country in the world, but he only got as far as Sweden and Ghana . I suspect Sufjan Stevens will at least have a couple more state albums, but couldn't possibly do all 50. By the way, I made that up about Mountain Goats. I don't think he ever intended or even joked about naming an album for each nation in the world. It just so happens that he has two albums named for countries.
Anyway, I'm going to try to pick up a copy of Come on feel the Illinoise today. Incidentally, Amazon.com has the different album art, including the one Reid talked about with Superman on it, and the same artwork with the Superman image taken out. There's also what appears to be a tour poster promoting "Sufjan Stevens and the Illinoisemakers". Check it out.
It's still a long way off, but he'll be playing the Cradle on Sept. 25. Sweet.

I think tonight I'll go to the ballgame. There's a chance of thunderstorms, as there is all week, but it looks pretty good right now.

It's time to go to work.

now playing:

Darling Buds Erotica

i decided to have a bed-in, but i forgot to invite everyone

I hope everyone had a good four-day weekend. I hope that you had more fun than I did. I wasn't able to make any plans, and there was so much rain and whatnot that I didn't go up to the ballgame. I did absolutely nothing. Just Six Feet Under and a movie. If you happen to be Canadian, then disregard all the happy horseshit about July 4. I'll get to you later in this post.
While I'm not surprised, I am annoyed that Rico fucked everything up. Again. I'm disliking Ruth more and more every week, and suddenly I don't mind George. I hated the shit out of him when he first came on. Actually, it started with that formica incident with Arthur. After that, it grew from distrust into hate. Then when they told us he was loony tunes, I felt bad for hating a crazy person. Now I'm actually starting to like him. Too bad Billy's going to murder everyone.

The movie last night was Spun. I don't really know what to say about this. Drugs, drugs drugs. It's about some crystal meth heads. There's some good actors (Jason Schwartzman, Patrick Fugit, Mickey Rourke, Peter Stormare), but I can't say that it's a "good" movie. There's also lots of music by Billy Corgan and there's a few scenes with the pathetic Deborah Harry. Those two things weren't enough to save this movie. Parts of it were funny, but the other 92% of it made me feel so uneasy that I couldn't like it. Contrarily, Requiem for a Dream made me really uneasy, but I liked it a lot. I'm sure it has a lot to do with the filmmakers. The dude who directed Spun has never done anything longer than four minutes before, and the writers have never written anything. Requiem, on the other hand was written by the brilliant Hubert Selby, Jr , and had great direction from Darren Aronofsky. To be honest, I don't know what made me decide to get Spun, but it didn't really suit my tastes.

The other day, I had another movie night. I watched Human Nature, which I thought was pretty good. A weird story, but good. I think I ordered it when I also ordered Danny Deckchair (Netflix recommended it because it has the same leading actors). Either I never noticed in the first place, or I forgot that it's directed by Michel Gondry. I immediately remembered, though, when I noted that it had the look of a Björk video. I mean, it looks exactly like a Björk video. Specifically "Human Behavior" and "Bachelorette". The way the greens and blues are so vibrant, those two videos and this movie look like a storybook. And that's the point. I liked "Human Nature". It's fun and entertaining. Aside from looking great, it's written by Charlie Kauffman, so you know you're going to get something good there. Check it out.

Okay. Now for you Canadians. What the F?!?!? You guys are supposed to be so much better. So much more civilized, with a much better political system and all this shit, but then I read about your notorious sex killer being released from prison . Okay. It's really disturbing that there's such a thing as a person who would torture, then rape, then kill some teenage girls. More disturbing that a woman would play a key role. A thousand fold more disturbing that one of the victims was her own sister. This is not a person who should be roaming the streets. Somehow, the Courts have determined that 12 years in prison is punishment enough for her actions. I don't think so. Whether it's incarceration, death or confinement to a mental institution, this woman really needs to be somewhere. Yeah, she spent 12 years in a jail, and yeah she cooperated with the authorities, but that's absurd. I don't get what would make a person do that, and I really don't get the "light" punishment.

now playing:

Explosions in the Sky The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place

it's true that i stole your lighter, and it's also true that i lost the map

I'm so glad my "weekend" is finally here. This week hasn't been a lot of fun. Re-discovering the Quasi record was great, and getting to see the "Which Doobie do you be" episode was also great. I'm tired as all get-out and I have people mad at me. That isn't great. And the state of my apartment is actually horrible. Now I have two days to relax and get some stuff done.
Among the "stuff" I wanted to get done was to figure out how to provide mp3s here. I'd like to think that I have a fair amount of savoir faire, but I felt like a goddamned imbecile when it came to this. It took me about 63 thousand years, but I figured out how to make it work. Only problem is, I don't have very much bandwidth to work with, so I won't be able to make a revolving jukebox like some of the other fancier blogs. Someday, I'll learn to make it so readers won't have to navigate away from the main page to listen to the mp3, but for now, this is as good as I can do.

The first song I'll be offering you is very appropriate for tomorrow. It's actually (in my opinion) one of the greatest indie pop songs ever written, as well.

Here's your mp3 for Fourth of July by Galaxie 500.

Many of you already know this song, but I'll encourage you to listen to it again anyway. It's probably been some time since you've dragged out your copy of This is our Music. As a little piece of trivia, the drum kit Galaxie 500 used during their beginnings belonged to Conan O'Brien. They all went to Harvard together. Conan graduated magna cum laude in American History. Yeah, you knew he was a dork, but not like that.

Go see the fireworks. Drink some beer. Eat some hotdogs. Listen to Galaxie 500

now playing:

Galaxie 500 Uncollected

press the eject and give me the tape

I'm sure you've all been waiting with baited breath to see what the Neglected Record of the week was. So I'll waste no time.
Maybe this has something to do with my failure to go to the Sleater-Kinney show, but the record of the week was Field Studies by Quasi. Give it a sample listen here. I freakin' loved it. I remember buying this record on a whim when I went up to DC for the Radiohead show that never happened . There was about a foot of standing water in the outdoor venue. Got that? The outdoor venue was, um, flooded. It turned out to be a great weekend anyway, as I got to hang out with some of you, dear and loyal readers. Anyway, I bought the cd on a whim, and I loved it right away. I wore it out for a few months, but it had the misfortune of being in the "q" section of my cd stacks. I rarely even think about anything in the q's. Quarterflash? Nope. Queensryche? No sir. Queen? Nah. Queen Sara Saturday? (remember them, NC folks?) Try again. This is the one and only record that lives in that wing of my library. I've digressed again. Why in holy fuck did I ever let this record collect one single smidgen of dust? I played it two times in a row from soup to nuts, then I went back and played my favorite jam from the disc one more time. I mean, I liked every song on the record, so it was hard to single one out, but a gun was being forced to my head, so I chose "A Fable With No Moral". I don't know what it is, but I just love that song. Throughout the album, though, there's lots of really cool textbook Janet ("don't call me Walt") Weiss drumming. But actually, I find her ex-husband's vocal stylings to be more compelling than anything else about this band. I had a lot of fun with this album, and I intend to keep it in "B" rotation for a while. If you happen to be Dutch or Deutsch, they'll be coming to your neck of the woods this summer, and you should go. I know I didn't go see S-K, and I don't really have a leg to stand on, but I don't care. Do as I say, not as I do. Okay, here's the thing. Maybe I'm just getting too old, and I can't RO-CO anymore, but Sleater Kinney is just too loud. There. I said it. Quasi isn't at all like that.
These things aren't meant to be record reviews so much as a retelling of my listening experience, so I won't get into the nuts and bolts of it. Nonetheless, I'll give Field Studies 4 ½ out of a possible 5 saute pans.

Of course the Scrabble geek in me started to think about the possibilities of playing the word "QUASI" in a game. I came up with a hypothetical situation in which my opponent has played ZIT at H12¹, through an existing I for 22 points. It's pretty late in the game, and he thinks he's setting himself up to hook an S or an I to ZIT, getting a triple word in both directions. He knows there's only one S and one I left, but is taking a chance that I don't have either. I play QUASI from 15D ², hooking the I to ZIT. 72 for QUASI and 39 for ZITI for a total of 111. For a non-bingo, that would be a spectacular play. For the same points, I could also play QUAIS, which is also an acceptable play. But Janet Weiss plays drums for Quasi, so that's the freakin' point here. This is, of course a theoretical play that wouldn't happen over a real table. Nobody would play ZIT there, leaving the triple for the taking.

now playing:

Throwing Muses University

¹ The Srabble board is a 15 by 15 grid. For purposes of tracking plays, the colums are lettered A through O (left to right). The rows are numbered 1 through 15 (top to bottom). When a play is made vertically, the coordinates of its starting position are determined by the letter first, then the number. A horizontal play is tracked using the number/letter coordinate. In the example, the Z in ZIT was placed in the center column (H), and on the fourth row from the bottom (12). The play is made vertically, so the letter comes first. It starts at H12, and that's all the info needed. Z is on a Double Letter space. 20 for that and one each for I and T. 22 points.

² In this example, QUASI was played alon the bottom row, starting in the fourth space from the left. Since it's played horizontally, the number goes first. It starts at 15D. The Q is on a Double Letter space. 20 for that and one each for U, A, S, I. 24 points for the word, but since the I landed on the Triple Word space, it becomes 72. Since I made ZIT become ZITI, I also get to triple that word. 10 for the Z, and one each for I, T , I (I don't get to double the Z since it was already on the board). 13 tripled is 39. added to the 72 is 111.