Too much job, not enough posts

I apologize for the lack of fresh material this last week. I have two or three items in my "To Be Blogged About" file, including a quote from Tom DeLay last Friday that reminds me of the time I almost got my ass beat my the entire Syracuse Hockey team as well as the time I ate a Baby Ruth right before I walked into my dentist's office.

Quality content coming soon...in the meantime, in turns out God doesn't want to hear about it. For real.

Randy was right.

Chocolate milk?

Click-clack goes the tile

Is that a poker hand or a Capri Sun pouch? Seriously.

1. Rahm Emannuel, the supposedly real-life Josh Lyman, gets some more deserved props for his 2006 strategy to bring the heat to Congressional Republicans. 2. You, Music Lover. Does your job, family or otherwise hectic schedule keep you from spending the necessary hours combing the internet to research bands, scenes and mp3s you think you might like? Want to know what the "kids" you hold in contempt are raving about? Feeling too much like Mr. Jones? Once again, the internets has got your back. Entertainment Weekly, constant bastion of alterna-cool culture, profiles the top 25 music sites on the web. Personal favorites mentioned include Pandora, Seattle's KEXP and NPR's All Songs Considered archive. One not mentioned and strictly for hip-hoppers: Mastermix.org. Get your rocks off.

Happy Birthday Bobby

I was thinkin bout diamonds and the world's biggest necklace!

Some videos to celebrate America's greatest living artist. I will cry when he is gone.

1. A classic from my favorite Dylan era, the Desire/Rolling Thunder/Scarlet Rivera/Is That Face Paint or Cocaine tour: Tangled Up in Blue

2. Bob and the Man in Black do Girl from the North Country

3. From Don't Look Back, the video for Subterranean Homesick Blues that inspired that other video by INXS.

4. Not Bob but one of his tunes - Pearl Jam doing Masters of War from the 1992 Dylan Tribute concert. I threw this one in so I could also mention that I'm finally catching Pearl Jam live in concert this Sunday - the last band on my list of bands I need to see before I'm able to die happy. I remember making this list for the first time immediately after I saw Dylan play the Landmark Theatre in Syracuse back in 1996 just so I could scratch his name off the list.

5. My favorite Dylan tune, Isis, with the man at the peak of his ability to perform on lots and lots of cocaine.

Viva la Boken

Not to bite Wade's steelo but this place is as real as it gets...shrimp parm w/ fresh mutz!

Most of you know I spent the better part of last year working in Hoboken, NJ and I had many, many memorable adventures. It's a great little town, just across the river from Manhattan, where 1/4 of the under-30 crowd seemed to have graduated from Syracuse University, though these were not the kids I hung out with in college. The youngsters blend in nicely with the elderly ethnic scene to create a vibe similar to what I can only imagine it would be like if you stuck Rutgers in the middle of Sicily. Evidence of the Italian diaspora before your very eyes.

Dedicated blogger and comedian Adam Wade has similar feelings about Hoboken. He's faithfully portrayed Hoboken's small-town feel and conveys the sense of community Hobokenites enjoy.

I never bumped into Adam while I was there but I'll look for him when I go back next spring. I know from these videos we have at least one bar in common:

Adam asks the Reverend: Is it really tricky to rock a rhyme?

Adam's constant praise of a particular Italian Tuna sandwich led Chelsea Peretti over from NYC and begat this funny little thing. I prefer Fiore's shrimp parmigiana (wednesdays!) but Wade is down with my man Greg from the Farside so you know he's good peoples.

Kinda funny cause it's kinda true

This "If I Were President" video from the most recent SNL evoked a range of emotions.

I Spit Hot Fire!

Luck Dragon or phallic cloud of volcanic ash?

1. Washington Post has some crazy photos of Mt. Merapi in Indonesia blowing it's stack this morning.

2. Skype finally made it happen. Free calls to cellphones from your computer. I've been hyping this service when it was just laptop-to-laptop but now it's ready for primetime. Does this remind anyone else of the Napster days? All this free shit: Wikipedia, YouTube, Google, now free phonecalls. Technological advancements have been occuring at a faster clip than our morality or legal systems can keep up with (i.e. the "is-it-legal-to-kill-my-clone" question) but finally technology has zoomed by industry's ability to capture and profit. If Napster taught us anything it's milk the good stuff before it disappears.

3. If it's sunny where you are, open your windows and turn this up.

4. Wilco played a new tune on Conan Friday night. Less Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, more Huey Lewis meets Sam Cooke.

Obama/Wilco '06

Conan O'Brian has been filming his show in Chicago all week and he closes the run with some of the best Chicago has to offer. Old friends Barack Obama and Wilco team up to send Conan off with a bang.

Backstage @ Farm Aid 2005

I haven't seen any of the Chicago shows but this clip of Conan and his Chicago tour guide, Mr. T, is hysterical. "If you got a big building and your name ain't written on it, I'm not gonna recognize it."

Come to Butthead...for permission

Breakin the law, breakin the law!

The Boston Globe has some excellent reporting on the Bush Administration's blatant violations of federal law and it's quest to wield power from the Executive Branch like the Sheriff of Nottingham.

This count does not include the Jenna Bush "statute", which is documented to have been violated several thousand times.

The original article calling attention to the hundreds of statutes violated by this Administration.

A list of some of the many statutes broken and the context in which they occured.

Peel back the Spam to reveal...

I don't know how to get the above graphic to be bigger but it's a snapshot of an email I got recently that Yahoo directed to my Bulk mail folder. Normally I just delete such emails after a quick scan of the folder to make sure nothing important strayed from my Inbox, but this particular subject line caught my eye.

"Dear Sir" it begins, in appropriately capitalized letters. Formal, friendly, complimentary, suggesting a heretofore unfamiliar author. I am flattered and therefore intrigued. I continue...

"i am interested..." The breakdown in common grammatical rules as evidenced by the lower-case "i" instantly sends up a flare of mistrust. I associate such typos with the steady stream of spam I receive inquiring as to whether I "stack up" or want to "add rigidity". If you're not professional enough to spell-check your emails, I'm sure as hell not letting you anywhere near my privates. That's my motto.

However, it's the final two words of the subject line that give me pause...

"...in it". In. IT. "Dear Sir, I am interested in it". Oh, really? And just what is IT that you are interested in, Ms. Dobson? I have put nothing up for sale, no ad in the paper. I have made no general inquiries seeking input or opinions from strangers. There are no doggie-bags for servants or orphans or any others likely to address me as 'Sir'.

I can only wonder what the IT this God-willingly lovely woman, Jocelyn Dobson, is interested in. It could easily be some sort of sex act. It could also be something more clever, as I am inclined to think, judging by the studious aloofness of the email's subject. I have yet to open the email so that all of you can take a guess at what the IT actually is.

Those who guess correctly will be able to post whatever they want on this site - embarassing photos of your ex, your demo, your J-Date URL, whatever. Of course, if no one participates I'll just ignore the email and none of us will ever know the truth. That secret will die with Ms. Dobson so take your best guess, and please be as specific as possible in case of a tie.

Blog Mix Tape

I relate to John Cusack's character in High Fidelity. I'm sure lots of guys do. That being said, here are three observations that all involve breaking events and artifacts into categores suitable for ranking:

1. Happy Anniversary to me.

16 years ago today I became a man in the eyes of the Jewish faith. Not coincidentally, this is the 16th Anniversary of My Greatest Social Calendar Year Ever. Better than sophomore year of college, better than recent years involving much travel. Back in 1990, there were about 40 kids in my hebrew school class. Every one of them had a Bar or Bat Mitzvah and I was invited to most of them. That meant almost every weekend for a full year I was slipping into my suit (brown) and scoping hotel ballrooms for any fly relatives of my classmates. It didn't matter that we were doing the Electric Slide and playing Coke and Pepsi. We were learning how to mack. And if you can mack while doing the Electric Slide, you deserve to be considered a man in the eyes of any faith.

2. Band of Horses' Everything All the Time deserves consideration for Top Ten "Sunday Morning" Albums Released This Millenium. Aquarium Drunkard tagged these guys just right: combo of Built to Spill, My Morning Jacket and the Shins....MMJ's shoe-gazing younger brothers.

Band of Horses:

The Funeral

I Lost My Dingle on the Red Line

Bass Song

Wicked

3. Items are listed so that the lister may derive the pleasure of scratching them from the list upon completion. I was recently given much joy by being able to scratch an item off my "Things That Must Be Created So I May View Them Before I Die" list, namely, a movie about penguins narrated by Morgan Freeman. That came in at #7.

But today, I put a big ol' scratcheroo through #3! An astounding juggling performance set to the Beatles' Abbey Road medley. Amazing!

Have a good weekend everybody!

Why is this man smiling?

It's a great day for baseball in D.C.

Now listening

Over and over and over and over and over again...

I know this jam is everywhere right now but damned if I can't get it out of my head.

Does that make me crazy?

Downloaded the album on iTunes yesterday and can't. stop. playing. it.

Bubba the Broker Bans Bubbly

I could totally write headlines for the New York Post.

William J. Clinton Foundation successfully negotiates to get soda out of schools. Way to go, Bill. Seriously.

Steve Colbert has GIANT balls

Steven Colbert roasts Bush, the press corps and says Fuck You Very Much to Scalia in the original Sicilian.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

The new thing you learned today

John Doe is to America as ________ is to Australia.

Answer: Fred Nerk.

Deep Smit

I touched this woman's hand

on the subway tonight
and we both looked
straight ahead

And away we go...

I leave for Philly tomorrow morning to look at apartments and try to nestle a bit before I settle into my job for the rest of the year. As a believer in signs and omens and the ability of early results to predict overall success, I am very happy that Philly 2006 gets kicked off the right way on Friday night with a Beef and Beer Pong party some friends are hosting to benefit the American Cancer Society. Good times, good cause, good people...hopefully the campaign shakes down the same way.

In unrealted news, I've been reading a lot of science magazines lately. Nothing clinical but the latest issues of Scientific American and SEED are at my disposal for the subway ride home tonight. I've been saving a post about how my mind is completely blown by these things called mirror neurons. El Stence first hipped me to the article in the New York Times about them and stories of developments in the field seem to be popping up in every science mag I see. Until I get around to publishing the post you'll just have to trust me that these things are amazing parts of our brains that have evolved to help us learn language, develop empathy and infer the intentions behind peoples' actions. Oh, our amazing brains!

I also think that my recent fascination with these science mags has to do with the joy I get from reading about people that are intellectually curious and believe in science for science's sake. Obviously, those tendencies stand in stark contrast to those being espoused by our political leaders but it seems like American society as a whole has lost the spark for discovery and exploration. Not surprising I guess given the heaviness of recent times but dammit America! Snap out of it! There's a great big universe out there!

And giant oceans and microscopic creatures and bending strips of time near the speed of light! Not to mention all the cool stuff going on inside our own heads! There's so much we don't know yet - about our planet, about our solar system and about ourselves. What do you say, team? Brand new era of scientific discovery on Three! 1-2-3!

Enter the psychedelic swirl to the New Enlightenment

Are we there yet? No? OK, fine. So, it's gonna take a little bit more magic than fractals to get our exploration engine running. But if you're looking for some news that doesn't involve administration snow-jobs, alleged rapist student-athletes or nuclear-fueled nationalism, get yourself some science reading and nerd out.

Here's something to tide you over until I get the mirror neurons tribute ready. It's not a new discovery but still very cool: Mind-Controlling Wasps! In the meantime, I'm off to discover and explore in Pennsylvania. If you have any other cool science tales, please pass them on.

Cloud fractals: what the sky looks like in the New Enlightenment

Speaking of clobberin time...

Worst. Parent-Teacher Conference. Ever.



You can tell the decision to wallup was made early. Lady says "excuse me", squares up and lets one fly.

It's good to be back

Hello friends, apologies for the lack of fresh goodies the last week. Life's been taking up a lot of my time lately - working, travelling, celebrating birthdays and weddings, etcetera, etcetera...

The week started with some time reviewing reams and reams of polling data, voter databases and analyses of previous elections to start putting the state plan for PA together. Trying to make sense of all the data to figure out where the votes are going to come from is an intimidating deal but I've never been involved with this aspect of campaign planning before so I'm pretty psyched. I'm supposed to be heading up the Keystone State this week to start laying some groundwork and then before I know it it's gonna be June, then August, then I'll blink and it'll be November. Crazy. You know what time it is...


On Friday, I left D.C. to start making my way up to Albany. One of my good friends from college was getting married on Saturday but Friday was this old boy's birthday so a layover in NYC Friday night was in order. Hit the usual places with the usual gang and a good time was had by all.

Famous people born on April 21st:

Charlotte Bronte, John Muir, Queen Elizabeth II, Tony Danza, Iggy Pop, Andie McDowell, Robert Smith of The Cure, Charles Grodin and Catherine the Great. Can I get a hell yeah?

Tony flashing that winning Taurean smile

I manage to get one hour of sleep before up and at em in a car up the NYS Thruway to Capital City. Maria got married in the giant Catholic cathedral right next to Empire Plaza. The service was beautiful but as an M.O.T. I have many questions. For starters, who's really in charge of this thing? The guy with the white hat or the guy with the red hat? The guy in the red hat tells everybody when to sit and stand but the guy in the white hat keeps raising his arms up and singing loudly. In the name of brevancy I'll digress but it's a good thing the bride was a good friend of mine because organized religion on an empty stomach and an hour of sleep make Ben something something...


After the wedding comes the reception and when the Cuse is in the house with an open bar you know the good times are bout to flow like liquid gin..pictures and more posts coming soon.