Funny because it's true

What if Microsoft was called upon to redesign the less-is-more elegance of the iPod package? This video [use the link below instead] has the hilarious answer, complete with the Danny Elfman score from Pee-Wee's Big Adventure.

Via Digg.

Update: The site hosting the video is getting killed by the Digg bandwidth. If you read the comments in the Digg post itself (the second link), you might be able to find a mirror of the video somewhere. Or wait a day and try again when the Flood—er, Diggers—are devouring something else.

Update 2: At least for now, this is a better host.

Update 3: It has now been reported that Microsoft created this parody themselves. Read more here.

Artisan Church meta-blog project

I just had a great idea. What if every Artisan blogger wrote a piece about what Artisan means to him/her, and I read the posts, and then I collected snippets from everyone and posted a big meta-post here at P.F. for all the world to see?

Anyway, I think it's a great idea. I have talked with many of you lately who have shared how important Artisan has become in your life, and I think it'd be very nice to see all of your thoughts in one place.

Here are some guidelines.

Eligibility: Anyone who has a blog and attends Artisan can and should participate! I'll even make a special exception and read a MySpace blog for this purpose. (Ha ha.) Also, if you're a former Artisan who moved away, you can write about what it meant to you when you were here.

Content: Whatever you want to write is okay. If you want suggestions, how about this: What stood out to you when you first attended? What is the best part about following Jesus at Artisan? How has Artisan helped you understand who God is, or how to know God more? Has attending Artisan had any impact on major life decisions (such as where to work, live, etc.)? This is not an exhaustive list; feel free to ignore these suggestions and do your own thing if you already have ideas.

How to Share: Please publish your entry by Friday, March 3. That's this Friday, by the way. It would be helpful if you titled it "Artisan Church meta-blog project" for the sake of continuity. When you've published your thoughts, either contact me (see here if you don't know how), or leave a comment on this post. Provide a link if possible. I'll read them over the weekend and collect snippets. Then, I'll publish a summary on Monday, March 6.

Sound good? I'm excited to hear what you've got to say. Get blogging!

Mini-review XIV: The Longest Yard

The movie: The Longest Yard

Recommended? No.

Comments: Yet another supposedly classic movie that I found totally disappointing. (I remembered since my last review that the other one in that list should have been Caddyshack.) I can't figure out why anyone would want to rewatch this movie, let alone remake it. I like football, and I like prison movies, but I thought this was lame-o. Can someone please tell me what the appeal is here?

Walk the Line on DVD

Next week's New Release Tuesday (often the happiest day of the week) has at least one big title: Walk the Line on DVD. It's a 2-disc set with tons of special features, including the usual "making of" featurette, a couple documentary-style stories about Johnny Cash, three music videos, and ten deleted scenes. Nice!

If you decide to buy this for me, make sure you leave a comment so I don't end up with a dozen copies. (Ha.)

Blogging with said widget

I'm posting this from the Dashboard widget I mentioned below. It says I can make stuff bold or italicized using the standard keyboard shortcuts. Looks like I can. That's pretty cool. It doesn't appear to support OS X's spellchecker, though. Nuts to that.

In other news, the Gmail widget is rather large. So large, in fact, that there is plenty of room to show message bodies and/or compose in the widget itself. That is, there would be if Google had built it to allow those actions. But they didn't. I'll give it a few days, but I'm guessing it will be going away soon.

I'll probably keep the Blogger widget, though.

Google Dashboard widgets

Google just announced some nice Macintosh Dashboard Widgets.

Of interest to me are the Gmail notifier and the Blogger widget (since DashBlog was broken last time I tried it), but others may also be interested in the Search History widget. Click the link in the previous paragraph to go to the download page.

(Via Ars.)

Mini-review XIII: Nine Lives

The film: Nine Lives

Recommended? Highly.

Comments: A collection of nine short films, each about a woman facing sacrifice and loss. Some of the stories are interconnected, but this movie doesn't beat you over the head with that like another one I know. Each film is one long shot, which allows them to develop very organically and unfold powerfully. The acting is superb. (Check out the impressive cast!) Nine Lives flew under the radar somewhat in 2006; there were a handful of films that grabbed enormous media attention, and a small-budget film like this was easy to miss. But it would be a shame to let it go by.

(For an explanation of the Mini-review series, click here.)

Mini-review XII: The Crow

Movie: The Crow

Recommended: Not unless you look like this.

Comments: You know, I'm really beginning to doubt the staying power of movies. This is the latest in a string of movies that I've rented because they had a profound impact on the popular culture of their day, and each one has been a disappointment. (If you want to know, some of the others were Heathers, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and the original Mel Brooks version of The Producers. There's at least one other that I can't remember now.) In this case, I was in high school during the heyday of The Crow. I mean, I actually saw people—and not just girls—with pictures of Brandon Lee taped to the inside of their locker doors. Seriously, Brandon Lee! Anyone who was not in high school in 1994, or who isn't a martial arts nerd (the ironic type of nerd who could beat the captain of the football team in a fight), doesn't even know who Brandon Lee is. I should be one of the people who is powerfully impacted by this movie. But since I watched it twelve years after its release, it just seemed like another bad action/horror flick. What's the deal here? Do movies just die after a few years, henceforth only to be special to those who saw them during the right window of time? Will people be saying this about Memento or The Matrix in a decade?

(For an explanation of the Mini-review series, click here.)

Camino

I just fired the Fox.

Mac users either love the Firefox browser or they loathe it. The lovers tout its nearly limitless extensibility, and the loathers complain that it is stunningly ugly. I never really got too passionate about it; mostly I just thought it was too slow for everyday use.

So, I've been solidly in the Safari camp, but I've kept a copy of Firefox in the dock for those sites that don't work with Safari. But no more.

With the release of Camino 1.0, I found the perfect second-string browser. It's built on the same rendering engine as Firefox, but it's written in a Mac-native language (Cocoa) like Safari. That means it can handle all the same sites as Firefox, but it looks great—unlike Firefox. And for whatever reason, it is very fast.

It's not quite ready to challenge for the starting job, mostly because it lacks native spellcheck and RSS support. But I've read that those features are coming soon, so it's not outside the realm of possibility that I would switch. In the meantime, Camino has an attractive, clean interface, snappy pageloads, and tabbed browsing. I don't really need a whole lot more than that in a second browser.

I can't say I was all broken up about making Firefox go "poof." If you're a Mac user and haven't yet checked out Camino, give it a try.

My wife's sense of humor

When I turned on the computer this morning, I saw this:



You can click the photo to enlarge it, but that's Claire from TV's Lost with a Stickie note by her mouth that says "Scott is dreamy." Of course the feeling is mutual, Claire...

Tracey knows of my "affection" for Claire, so she put this all together for her own amusement. Well played, Tracey, well played.

Ahhh. Pitchers and catchers report.

This picture makes me so happy. What a beautiful image.

P.F. in syndication

No, I won't be publishing reruns. I'm not out of original ways to bore you yet! You may notice that I have added a link in the sidebar for my site feed. Here's why I did it, and what the heck it means, for those who may not know.

I've been watching the statistics for how people come to visit my blog, and it seems there are several ways. Some people follow links from other blogs, sometimes their own. Others don't seem to remember the URL (sjaustin.blogspot.com) and do a search for "postus frequentus." I'm flattered that I chose a title comprised of made-up Latinish words that are apparently more memorable than my own name.

But the best way to access my blog (or any blog, really) is through the site "feed." You may not know this, but Blogger provides a syndication feature for all its blogs. Every time I post something new, Blogger notifies anyone who has subscribed to my site's feed that there is new content available. The technological details are probably unimportant, but here's a quick rundown. Site feeds are generally referred to as RSS ("really simple syndication"), which is a little bit like calling a tissue a Kleenex. Technically not all site feeds are RSS; in fact, Blogger's feeds use a service called Atom. But "RSS" is increasingly a catch-all term that includes both actual RSS feeds and Atom feeds.

In order to gain the benefits of an RSS feed, you have to subscribe to it. There are two major ways: within a special application (called a news reader or a new aggregator), or through a web-based service. For those who might be interested, I've broken it down for you here. It is easy, even though it might seem a little overwhelming at first.

Windows users:

Note: Since it has been three years since I have used Windows for more than a painful half-hour here and there, my knowledge is limited. Windows power users, feel free to add your advice in the comments.

I don't know very much about stand-alone news readers on Windows, and for most people, a web-based alternative will be preferable anyway. My quick research indicates that Newz Crawler might be a good app for ambitious users to try. If you just want to use a web-based version, here is my advice:

Use Firefox as a browser. Use Internet Explorer exactly one more time, long enough to navigate to the Firefox website and download it. Seriously, if the little blue "e" on your desktop is all you've ever known of the internet, you are missing out. Firefox is faster than Internet Explorer, and it has many more features, to say nothing of the fact that it does a much better job of keeping you safe from malicious software you might accumulate on the web.

When you browse with Firefox, you can add a "Live Bookmark," a drop down bookmark in your toolbar that shows a menu of the most recent posts from an RSS site. Here's a screenshot of what this looks like (click to enlarge):



As you can see, the menu contains a list of my most recent post titles. I can click those titles and go straight to the new content.

This is a nice feature, but wouldn't it be nice if Firefox would notify me that there had been something added since I last looked at a site? Firefox itself does not do this, but a simple extension (plugin) does. There are actually several extensions that do this, but my Windows-using friends overwhelmingly prefer Sage. I don't use Firefox for RSS, so I don't have Sage installed and can't provide a screenshot. But it's a simple, efficient tool, easy to install and use.

Of course, you could wait for Microsoft to get its act together with Internet Explorer 7.0, which will (finally) support RSS. IE7 has just entered the testing period, however, and it will be a while before it's ready for public consumption.

If you must stay with Internet Explorer but still want to use a web-based RSS reader, try Google Reader.

Mac users:

For a stand-alone application, it's hard to imagine a better product than Ranchero's NetNewsWire. The lite (read: free) version is plenty to get you started, and it's good to support an indie Mac software developer.

But for simple pulling of RSS feeds, just use Safari. (You could also use Firefox and/or Sage, just as you could on Windows, but I find Safari to be faster and much more pleasing to the eye.)

Funny shirts

In case anyone wants to buy me a T-shirt for being such an awesome blogger, here are two I think are good:


"What Wouldn't Jesus Do?," the cream of the crop at the very funny Busted Tees.


"Good Grammar Costs Nothing," available from the good people at Television Without Pity.

Monday Column: Warrantless vs. Unwarranted

For this week's column, I'm talking politics. I haven't written about politics much since the presidential election, partly because it's boring and discouraging, but mostly because I'm simply more reluctant lately to wade into these waters in a blog format—for reasons I won't go into. This particular political topic, however, was inspired by a bit of word-nerdery I've been pondering a lot over the last few weeks, so I let it slip in. In reality, I am not going to express a strong political opinion about this matter; I'll dodge it and make general observations instead.

Everywhere you go, you see articles about the Bush administration's "warrantless wiretaps," and I'm using quotation marks to quote the phrase as it is used in the articles, not to editorialize in the scare-quote style of the Reuters "news" service. For a word no one ever uses, "warrantless" is sure getting a lot of play these days. For example, my browser's built-in spellchecker flagged "warrantless" as a non-word; yet a Google search for the word returns over four million pages containing it.

In the context of these stories, the word literally means "without a warrant," that is, without a court order. The political implications are complex; most people are upset not that the government is listening to phone calls at all, but that one branch of government (the executive) is apparently abusing the separation of powers by circumventing another branch (the judicial). Or at least that's what people should be upset about; I imagine some citizens—who are sadly ignorant of history—are just now getting around to being upset that the government can listen to their phone calls at all.

Interestingly, there is another part of this debate that doesn't get much attention and which is affected by what I'm clumsily calling the "unfortunate pseudo-double entendre" of the key word, warrantless. The question that is not getting very much attention is this: should this program be undertaken somehow? In other words, is the warrantless wiretap also an unwarranted wiretap? I think most people, even conservatives in their most intellectually honest moments, are willing to admit that the surveillance program as it stands raises some concerns about civil liberties. But I also think most people, even liberals in their most intellectually honest moments, support the surveillance of conversations between overseas members of Al Qaeda and people who currently reside on American soil, because it's a matter of national security. The debate swirls around those pesky matters of the rule of law and due process.

Here's an interesting exchange from NBC's Meet the Press yesterday. Tim Russert asks former Democratic senator Tom Daschle and current Democratic representative Jane Harman about the program (from page 5 of the transcript):

MR. RUSSERT: Senator Daschle, knowing what we know now, should the president stop this program?

SEN. DASCHLE: No, absolutely not. I think it’s a very valuable program. But again, as I said, it’s a false choice, Tim, to say that you can either stop the program or protect the rules of law. I think we’ve got to respect the rule of law, and that’s what this is about. The law was put in place, it’s worked effectively, we know now it can be just as applicable. If they want to see some changes to it, let’s find changes. I think there ought to be an investigation by the appropriate committees of Congress and look into NSA to see how we might it effectively. Let’s not just depend on the administration to give us their guidance, let’s look at it ourselves. Let’s do that. And I think if we did that, we can make this law work, and we can do both: protect the rule of law and protect the citizens of the United States.

MR. RUSSERT: Do you think the program should be stopped?

REP. HARMAN: No. I think the program should go on, I think the program should fully comply with FISA.

So the problem—at least for these two political leaders, and I think for most American citizens—is not that these wiretaps are unwarranted, but that they are occurring without a warrant. Now first, I must say that I find the wordplay here endlessly entertaining. I know that makes me extremely weird, but it does. Second, I do hope that examining the meaning of the words might help us frame the debate a little more fairly.

And third. Third, a plea. Please, please, dear politicians, stop. Stop. Stop using this as a political weapon. Republicans, stop implying that Democrats don't care about national security. Democrats, stop insinuating that Republicans don't care about civil liberties. Neither one is true, and you all know it. Just stop it, all of you, and grow up. Change the damn law. Or don't. But either way, just stop. It's not helpful to the political culture of the country, and it's sure not helping advance the estranged twin causes of national security and civil liberties.

Technology, the solution to—and cause of—all life's problems

This is yet another bit of proof that we are living in a grand, glorious technological era.

People out walking in New York City see stuff on the curb waiting to be picked up on trash day. They take pictures of it with their cell phones. Then they email the pictures and an appropriate description to this site, where the items are posted on a Google Map so others can go pick up the stuff. (Via Digg.)

The phobias of C.S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis on his nearly lifelong fear of insects*:

"To this day I could almost find it in my heart to rationalize and justify my phobia. As Owen Barfield once said to me, 'The trouble with insects is that they are like French locomotives—they have all the works on the outside.' The works—that is the trouble. Their angular limbs, their jerky movements, their dry, metallic noises, all suggest either machines that have come to life or life degenerating into mechanism. You may add that in the hive and the anthill we see fully realized the two things that some of us most dread for our own species—the dominance of the female and the dominance of the collective."

Lewis was undoubtedly brilliant and was perhaps the greatest Christian apologist of the twentieth century. But when it came to the role and place of women, he was unable to transcend the cultural retardation of his day (1898-1963). Fortunately, I am consistently able to to resist any such provincial bias. Which is a sarcastic way of wondering in what ways I am blinded by the assumptions of my day.

A homemade cookie to the first commenter who can correctly name the two other famous men who died the same day as Lewis.

*Quotation taken from Surprised By Joy, Harcourt Brace Janovich, 1956.

Idol buries Grammy Awards

Reuters reports that American Idol killed the Grammys in the ratings Wednesday night:

American Idol, airing on the Fox network opposite the first hour of CBS's Grammy Awards telecast, averaged 28 million viewers, compared to 15 million for the Grammys, Nielsen Media Research reported in early figures on Thursday.

You could make a lot of easy points here: the Grammys are nothing more than farcical navel-gazery; Ryan Seacrest continues to stretch his inexplicable fifteen minutes with no end in sight; on and on.

I prefer to make the observation that in the world we live in, it is increasingly possible for the "little" guys—in this case a handful of amateur singers and an army of millions of armchair record execs eager to give thumbs up or down to said singers—to outshine the establishment. Not only is the culture shifting in practical ways in order to make this possible, but it is apparently also shifting in sentimental ways, creating a groundswell of public support for the new world.

And in a weird intersection of the two worlds, Kelly Clarkson took home the Grammys for best female pop vocal performance and best pop vocal album. She made no mention of Idol in her acceptance speeches.

Mini-review XI: Rock School

Movie: Rock School (Not to be confused with Jack Black's School of Rock, which was funny but fictional.)

Recommended? Highly.

Comments: First of all, any documentary featuring a 12-year old who can play guitar way better than I can is okay in my book. But really this movie is about a demanding music teacher teaching uniquely talented kids how to play music—not just any music, but rock and roll. And not just playing it in a garage—actually going to clubs and international festivals and performing it! If you can stand a lot of rock and roll swearing, definitely check this movie out. It's a fascinating film with great characters and enjoyable concert footage.

(For an explanation of the Mini-review series, click here.)

My favorite Super Bowl commercial

For the second year in a row, Ameriquest Mortgage Company aired my favorite Super Bowl commercial. Thanks to a snazzy new "Snag" feature over at ifilm, you can watch it right here, embedded in my blog.



Isn't that cool? In fact, let's make this a game. (I refuse to use that other word.) Blogging friends, go to ifilm's Super Bow XL page, use the Snag feature to put your favorite ad in your blog, and then leave a comment here with a link.

Incidentally, last year's Ameriquest "Cat Killer" ad was my favorite. They didn't have that Snag feature last year, so if you want to watch it again, you'll have to go here and scroll down to view it.

Super Bowl pool answers

We had a great time at the Artisan Church Super Bowl party last night. We had nine (nine!) pots of chili for the cook-off, all of them very tasty. And the annual pool was a fun success. A college student won the iPod nano this year. That made me happy. (Last year the winner was an engineer who could probably buy three iPods with the money from one month of car payments—he won it fair and square, but it wasn't as if it was a big thrill.)

Here are the answers to the pool I posted yesterday.

1. Will the first kickoff be returned past the 30-yard line?

No. It was returned to about the 20.

2. Who will attempt the first field goal?

The Seahawks.

3. Who will punt first in the second quarter?

The Steelers punted on the first play of the second quarter.

4. Which position will score the first touchdown?

QB (rushing.)

5. Who will have the most 3rd quarter rushing yards? Shaun Alexander or the entire Steelers team?

The Steelers team did, mostly on the strength of a record-setting dash of 75 yards by Fast Willie Parker.

6. Will the last team to score win the game?

Yes. The last score of the game was the now-famous Fake-39 Toss X-Reverse Pass, very fun to watch.

7. Which team will benefit from the game’s first replay challenge?

The Seahawks.

8. Will the combined number of points scored be over or under 46.5?

Way, way under. The total was 31. Real exciting.

9. Will the teams combine to score more touchdowns or field goals?

TDs by a score of 4 to 1.

10. The Steelers are 4.5-point favorites. Who wins against the spread?

The Steelers. (They won by 11.)

11. Which company will have its ad shown earliest in the game?

You know what, I'm just gonna skip the rest. All these advertising questions have multiple choice answers, and I don't really feel like copying them all in. And let's face it, no one has bothered to read this far anyway. If you're really desperate for the answers, email me and we'll work something out.

Super Bowl Pool

One of my favorite events of the year is our church Super Bowl Party. Two years ago, we held it at my house. Last year, it was at the very large house of another family. This year, we're blowing out the church building! 150" projection screen, woo hoo.

The common thread each year has been a fun pool that I put together, where participants must predict 20 outcomes, roughly half about the football game itself and half about the advertisements. This way, everyone can enjoy it, I hope. This year we're giving away a black iPod nano to the winner!

I've posted a PDF of the pool in case anyone might like to use it tonight at your own Super Bowl party. Although most of the questions are strictly prediction, there are a few questions that you'd be able to get by research. So if you're coming to the party tonight, please wait and get your printed copy there. Remember, cheating makes the Baby Jesus cry.

For all you up-and-uppers, click here for the PDF. I'll post the correct answers sometime tomorrow. Enjoy the game!

Mini-review X: Junebug

Junebug

Recommended? Yes

Comments: About 15 minutes in, I turned to Tracey and said, "I'm going to give this movie ten more minutes." It was just too quirky for me in the beginning. By the end of the ten minutes, though, I had warmed to it and started to enjoy it. Junebug is an offbeat but ultimately tender story, and what affected me the most about it was the fascinating interaction between Ashley, a bubbly, simple country girl, and Madeline, her urbane, cosmopolitan new sister-in-law, who only only enters Ashley's small world because she hopes to strike a gallery deal with an artist who lives nearby. I also enjoyed the portrayal of basic southern evangelicalism, which was uncannily accurate and not unkind.

People who prefer big-budget, straight-ahead plotlines and those who are easily offended by the portrayal of sexuality should probably look elsewhere, but this film will work well for the indie film house crowd. It is very finely acted at every point.

(For an explanation of the Mini-review series, click here.)

New shoes

A few years back at the beginning of the Emergent Convention in San Diego, Doug Pagitt came to the stage and said something I remember vividly. He said, and I'm paraphrasing, "I know there is a tendency sometimes at these gatherings to talk about our frustrations about ministry in this difficult context and basically be pissed off. But here's the deal: I just bought new shoes, and I'm wearing them right now, and I don't wanna be pissed off. So let's all agree that we're not going to be pissed off this week, okay?"

I really liked that. Actually, I liked the shoes themselves, too: white Adidas with blue stripes. I liked them so much that I went out and bought a pair. And then when they broke down, I bought another pair. Well, that second pair is getting pretty gray now too, so this week I ordered some new shoes from Zappos.com. I decided to go in a different direction this time. I got some Dr. Martens, mostly because I hear they last forever, but also because I wanted something a little more dramatic and grown-up than white sneakers. And Zappos was running a great sale on them, which will probably be over by the time you read this.

I've never owned a pair of Doc Martens before. When they became popular while I was in high school, there was no way I was spending a hundred bucks on shoes that did not have the Air Jordan logo on them. And my parents sure weren't about to kick in a Benjamin for mosh pit wear. I never really got the whole "boot" thing anyway. Well, the boots I got today look wicked sharp and they're very comfortable, too. Here's hoping they hold up to their reputation.

New shoes do make a man feel good. And I don't wanna be pissed off right now.

Ahh.

Wifi on the porch in February. No coat on. Life is good.

Exhaust; or, The First and Hopefully Last P.F. "Cereal Post"

I feel like life has pummeled me lately. I mean in a good way, like the way sparring partners end up bruised and tired but not angry with each other. And I think if the Bloggies had a category for Most Strained Metaphor, I'd be champion of the world. But here's what I've been up to, and why I haven't posted much lately.

Friday night. Artisan had its first House Blend meeting. House Blend is our quasi-house church meeting, and I'm responsible for coordinating it. It is a monthly service of worship that takes place in someone's house and is entirely lay led. George and Margie Hillenbrand are our first hosts, and boy did they do a fantastic job.

Saturday morning. Gorgeous, sunny, and warm outside. Good news, since we were about to spend several hours outside. Artisan had several thousand door hangers printed with a hilarious and provocative graphic and information about our current sermon series, Sex, Love & God. You can see the graphic here (check that out) and read more about the series here. Tracey put Abel in the backpack carrier, and I grabbed a big bag of door hangers, and we walked around the Cobbs Hill neighborhood tacking them on people's doorknobs. In addition to being more physically demanding than playing Halo (thanks a lot, Jones), this was somewhat emotionally challenging as well. I don't do so well with anything that could be perceived as intrusive or unwanted, so every time I heard a door slam, I thought someone was going to come down off the porch with a broom handle and give me what-for. In the end, we really enjoyed doing this. It was great to be outside.

Saturday evening. A meeting at Mel's place for the Artisan Guild Project, Volume One, a full CD of original music to be bundled with a chatbook of poetry and visual art. I'll be contributing one or two songs, I think. We're still in the very early stages of that, but it is exciting to think about what's ahead. And good to hang out with some very talented artists who are also excited to make this happen. Special props to Mike, who is doing a great job conceiving and overseeing this project.

Sunday. Church. Man, the house was packed, partly as a result of the door hangers and partly as a result of the topic itself. It was wonderful to feel the energy in the room with over 90 people in attendance.

Monday. Did Monday really happen? I think we actually went to the mall. Yes, that's what we did. Tracey got some new clothes for her new job, and I drooled over the 20" iMac Core Duos in the Apple Store. Then we ate some hideous food at Friendly's (I'm not sure they serve any other type), the memory of which was nearly erased by the delicious chocolate cake sundae we had for dessert.

Tuesday. Staff meeting, 9 am - 12 pm. Meetings. Because none of us is as dumb as all of us. That was good, though; if I have to have a three-hour meeting every week, there's no one else I'd rather have it with. Then I read a blog post that disturbed me and spent the next two days (well, almost) thinking about how to respond. But not before I made my triumphant return as a barista, working the closing shift at the cafe, all by myself like a big boy. I didn't get to bed until almost 2 am, which is thankfully a rare event for me these days. Oh wow, look at the time.

And today was Wednesday. Finally relaxed a little, spent most of the day hanging with Abel, then had a meeting cancelled and went to Guitar Center with Mike instead. Turns out I still want more guitars. Huh. We got Krispy Kreme on the way home. Made my reply to the blog post. Now it's time for bed.

I don't usually put the "What I'm Listening to Right Now" thing in my posts, but this time I will because it's so great and it fits my mood perfectly, and because it just ended, as if on cue. It was Radiohead's The Bends, which is just absolute magic. "Nice dream, nice dream." Here's to that.

Mini-review IX: Lackawanna Blues

Lackawanna Blues

Recommended? Sure.

Comments: A decent ensemble-type TV movie, set in the segregation of the '50s and '60s. "Nanny" is a great central character, a classic strong African-American woman, and the young boy who plays the narrator as a child does a good job, too. It bored me at points, but hey, that's what wifi is for. It is worth seeing. Oh, and bonus points for being set in the town where Tracey's grandfather was raised.

(For an explanation of the Mini-review series, click here.)