Still have KFOG on

It's been apparently a pretty long time since I've really listened to commercial music radio. Maybe a decade. But the latest thing they play is from the 80's anyway, so have I missed anything?

They played The Eurythimcs' (see Sept 7 entry)"Would I Lie To You." Stuck in traffic at the time, I deconstructed why this song always disappointed me. (no, it wasn't due to the lack of a euphonium).

The basic bottom, drums-base-guit, are great. Even the lead guitar histronics work. It's the glossy surface fixtures that blow the song. Like a poorly designed and cheap home improvement chain faucet - it makes everything look/feel/sound chinzy.

The horns. Or, are they synth horns? Utterly wrong. The arrangement, the playing. Yuck.

But the worst is Annie Lenox's lead vocal. Where she's providing the backing vocals(would I lie to you, would I lie to you honey? now would I say something that wasn't true....), that's all fine. If it only ended there. Her lead vocal is devoid of soul. It's a bad day in Memphis. Since we were stuck in the 80's, sitting in traffic, I immediately thought, "why didn't they invite David Byrne to provide the lead vocal?" Or, even Robert Palmer (rip)? That and a Memphis, or even a Muscle Shoals, horn section. Something much more loosey & goosey. Like James Brown used to order: "Hey man, your horns' too white. Get me a black horn in here!"

Then, a few exits later, I heard the new Sting song. He's got religion now, but it's for himself. Or, his music. Way out, Sting. Yay radio.

38 years in the can


Way back in 1966, RCA Records released the single Bad Way to Go by The Bruthers,
which should have gone on to become a garage band classic. Now, 38 years later, Sundazed,
is releasing their never heard before album.

This is the band from our block, as kids. I can't tell you how influential they were on my musical interests and development. Finally, a full LP release - and it comes out on my birthday!

Anyone in the NYC area want to go to the premier listening party, over in Piermont? Oct 19. I'm flying in.

48 and eleven months

1st, a PSA:

The wrapper of Columbus Dry Salami (Columbus Salami Company, South San Francisco) smells of bleach, or semen. I suggest you hang this sucker up in the cellar and let it age a bit.

~~~

It's all about middle-age.

~~~

Man, I'm having some serious middle-aged moments this weekend. There I was today, doing a 'chore,' and KFOG (see, I'm listening to KFOG - how middle-aged is that?) plays Magical Mystery Tour.

Oh yeah.......

roll up!

(hint, hint. or was that the beatles just being basically english? A: the walrus was paul)

for the mystery tour. rollaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhuuuuuuppp

And then there's the bridge, where they go:

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh.....the mystery toooo-ur."

That, my friends, is the purest dose of 1968 I could offer you.
Toooo-ur.
Say it with yer best Liverpuddlian (Schoose) accent.
As in:
She's the kynd-of-a-gal,
whew makes the neyws-o-the-wald,
yes you cud say she was atrrrac-tiv-lee-built.

~~~

So, if you weren't alive and relatively conscious in 1968, you may still get off to the Beatles, but I doubt it's the same way I do. And, in return, I'm sure I don't get whole piles of your shit. It all evens out, in the end.

~~~

Middle age hits me, in the form of Beatles tunes and weekend projects. We're still doing the renovation. Of course. It's geting very old. Accumulations of fuck-ups pile up. Sometimes I worry this renovation is turning into a gaudi cathedral.

~~~

Middle age hits me, when I realize I'm feeling really OK, sitting at home, at 9:52pm, on a saturday night.
My honey-bunny is here... and she's better than anything.
Even if she's already sleeping.
I'm so middle aged.

Verisign's robot.txt

A disturbing ramification of Verisign's new initiative to take control of inactive .com and .net DNS space is - the Web Archive is eroding away.

Here's hoping the archive folks, over in the Presidio, are up to the challenge. Save the Way Back Machine!

Recall Debate

Whatever.

I think Gray Davis won last night's debate, as moderated by Jerry Springer.

Radiohead Roschach
This is kinda cool. 5th grader’s listen to Radiohead and draw pictures of what the music means.

In the village, the peaceful village...

...the Ah-nold speaks tonight.

Naturally, the only ‘debate’ he’s deemed worthy of his time, is the canned one, with pre-scripted questions.

Sure, televised political debate has always been not much more than a partially realized Reality-TV premise. Who can forget the vicarious thrill, watching Nixon come totally unglued and sweaty, right on camera, as he realized what a huge Loser he was, next to the Olympian presence of JFK? Or the time Carter smiled a priceless cat-with-mouse smile, as Gerry Ford made the blunder of his career, pronouncing Poland wasn't a puppet state of the USSR.

But those were back in the day when the media, the TV, although already annoyingly present in our lives, still wasn’t truly dominant. At least I thought I could avoid it and still know what my political leaders were up to. Now that we’ve all grown up with TV and TV has grown up with us, it’s in control. Politically. This may not be news, but it’s still amazing to me how complacent, flexible, adaptable, accomodating, we are. We first let it in our lives to entertain us. Now, we let it rule us. Escapism isn't the primary agenda anymore.

Reagan’s “There you go again” line, was a significant turning point. Although impromptu, it had the earmark of a line that only an actor would know to be a true show-stopper. A line worthy of a John Wayne matinee audience cheer. Everyone tries to play it that way these days. Of course, some people are better actors than others. The first Bush was far too painful to watch. Remember ‘read my lips?’ Dirty Harry, he wasn’t. His boy, well, let’s not even discuss his performance abilities…

Whether they move you, or not, politicians are all ready for prime time players now. And this time it’s our tax dollars, not just our disposable income, they control.

A recall, of the recall, to recall. It’s something I’ll leave to TIVO to figure out.
There isn't a way to shut this thing off, is there?


And oh yeah………how about those Giants and A’s! !!

It's not very hot tonight, but one of my dogs has some serious gas

Do I have to have a point of view
And what about a viewpoint?
Is there a point, to pointing out this view
When I'm told it's rude to dewpoint?

Point.y

.

Baked to perfection

While other parts of the US are getting hurricaned, the Bay Area is baking! It's too hot to blog!

The rest of the recall pack

Come on, enough already from Cruz, Arianna, Ah-nold,Bill, etc. There's over a hundred other folks we need to hear from. And here they are....video interviews from - The Other Candidates!

Tommy I can hear you

Most 'inspirational' quotes are treacle. At the very least, it's often difficult to consider them relevant in our naughts' decade.

But for some reason, this Thomas Jefferson quotation makes good sense to me:

It is neither wealth nor splendor, but tranquility and occupation, which give happiness.

The tranquility part is obvious, but I'm surprised how true the occupation part resonates. Maybe the bodhisattva - versus the monk - gene is more dominant in me (Not that I'm either - but don't diss this dude for having aspirations!).

At the risk of ruining the sentimental moment, I heard this quote the other day, in a talk given by Jerry Sanders.

Misleader

Here's a new website, Misleader, to help keep track of the mis/dis information coming out of the white house these days. They launched with a big ad in the NYTimes too.

And the sound that you're now hearing...

is a B flat, from a Black Hole. At 57 octaves below our hearing, black holes are heavily into Doom Metal.

Thanks Jason, for the link!

I sound funny...

... because I hab a toad in ma noze.

---

But that's no excuse...

...not to talk about the recall!

Move On is making it easy to vote NO on the recall.

Printout their Mail In Ballot Request

Surprisingly, more than half of our normal polling places will be closed this election, due to time constraints! Has the mass media even mentioned that? Wouldn't that be a kick in the pants, if we go to our normal polling place on Oct 7 and it's dark? Vote by mail today!

Eeeeeyeeeeuuuuwwww

'eu-', the little Greek prefix, that could.
In combinational form, it modifies as
'well' & 'easily.'

So, let's try Eucalyptus.
eu + (the Greek) kaluptos (covered) = 'well covered'.
The unopened flower of the Eucalyptus Tree is protected by a cap.

Here's a good one: Eudemonic.
eu + daimon (guardian spirit) = happy.
Eudemonism is a system of ethics that bases moral obligation on the likelihood of actions producing happiness.
Eudemonic - conducive to happiness.

Eugenics is a modern word. Skip it.

Eunuch.
This one's got me nipped. I'll need to learn more Greek.
The etymology is eu + noukhos; with a literal translation as, 'bedchamber attendant.' What's a 'noukhos?'

Eupeptic, Euphemism, Eulogy, Europa....
they all come alive,
when you focus on the eu.

And have the Eurythmics ever played an euphonium?

---

Sunday Dose of Dubya

Did we really need that, to ruin an otherwise perfectly fine weekend?

You couldn't call it unexpected, but now it's The Terrorists behind all the snipering in Iraq.
Our unelected commander in chief is nothing, if not consistent.
Get me outta here!

Mein Fine Wine?

Lunardelli's Historical Wines

With labels like these, I can guess how tasty the wines must be. Too bad they're from the Veneto. A favorite region; at least until now.

Saturday's Shifty Words

Consider 'amateur'.
It's latin root - amator; 'a lover.'
A person who is fond of doing something, as a pastime.

Now, 'professional'.
From the latin professio, as in 'to profess.'
Profess - to claim, to pretend, purport, make a pretense.

CA Guv Recall Debate

Interesting first recall debate – and Davis’ ½ hour contrition – held in Walnut Creek last night. Of course, Arnold was a no show. For a body-building invincible droid, he sure is a chicken.

The best part of the evening was Arianna Huffington. Say what you will about her aires and her need for attention, but she was totally great. She didn’t pull any punches. Neither the Dems nor the Republicans were spared. She spoke frankly & knowledgably about the issues and didn’t shrink from pointing out the other candidates vested interests and hypocrisies. Arnold should be aware he’s already been outclassed on the media-friendly, witty, photogenic & humanist fronts.

And her politics are fine too.

I hope they ask this of a few Gubernatorial candidates...

San Jose’s bi-weekly freebie, The Wave, came up with a great way to pick your political candidates.

Rather than analyzing the spin, or digging up the dirt, they decided to get right to the heart of the matter: Is a particular candidate human or an insidious replicant, possessed of physical strength and computational abilities far exceeding our own, but lacking empathy and possibly even bent on our destruction as a species?

They applied The Voight-Kampff Test, created by Phillip K. Dick in his book, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and later used by Harrison Ford’s character, Deckard, in the film Blade Runner. The test uses a series of questions to evoke an emotional response which androids are incapable of having. They tried it out on some San Francisco mayoral candidates. Here’s the link to the tests and below are the results.

ANGELA ALIOTO ... is indeed a replicant, albeit one that “loves” the implanted memory of her mother. Keep an eye on her.

SUSAN LEAL: ... is a replicant. …we can tell that she’s at least a Nexus 7. If you vote for Susan, you will be electing a replicant, but one of the most highly advanced models available.

MATT GONZALEZ: …His obvious grogginess leads us to the conclusion that he is indeed a human, but one with an ill-formed sleep schedule.

TOM AMMIANO: Good work, Tom! You’re human! Now watch your back.

TONY RIBERA: Inconclusive. …Fifty-fifty he’s a skin job.

GAVIN NEWSOM: Almost too close to call. Almost. Newsom displays a defensiveness when his empathy is questioned. He’s aware that he’s being probed for emotional responses, and even expresses concern about this. However, this concern is alleviated a little too easily by our crafty V-K interviewer. Newsom is definitely a replicant. Probably a Nexus 5.

---

Speaking of *that* gubernatorial candidate, Arnoll is quoted:

The Wave: Would you ever give up acting if you went into politics?
Arnold Schwarzenegger: I would try to do movies at night and run the state during the day. – [Vol 3, Issue 14]