...of 2008 Tuesday, December 23, 2008

My friends always do a year-end Top Ten list that is circulated via e-mail touting each person's favorite albums of the past year. This used to be pretty simple. 10 albums - done. Not so anymore. I think it started last year, a couple EPs slipped in... oh and someone had some honorable mentions... oh yeah and then there was the "I didn't like the record, but I listened to the song more than anything else all year."

And then came this year... there was a Top 50 list (I confess I didn't even listen to 20 albums this year), a Top 10 Honorable Mentions list (which the author quickly confessed to being nothing more than a Top 20 list when coupled with his Top 10) and then various categories based on different qualifiers (albums I should give another listen; albums that grew on me BUT still didn't make my top 10; albums that were released in '07, but I did not hear a note until 2008 i swear; the best songs from albums that should have been cut down to ep's... well you get the point.)

I'm not sure where I'm going with this post other than to say it has been an amazing year in some respects. In other respects it's been really difficult. The point is that looking back over the past year I realized that music played a nice role as the soundtrack in the background. In fact it wasn't until I tried to build my own list that those melodic memories begin to fill my head, which in the end is the whole point of the reflection that occurs in the first week of winter and the last week of the calendar year.

So, without further delay and pondering... The Official Some Music I Listened To This Past Year That I Really Appreciate.

Thao - We Brave Bee Stings And All
Santogold - Santogold
Mason Jennings - In The Ever
Kings of Leon - Only By The Night
Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago
Conor Oberst - Conor Oberst
Amadou & Mariam - Welcome To Mali
Jon Foreman - Fall, Winter, Spring and Summer
Sigur Ros - Með Suð Í Eyrum Við Spilum Endalaust
Paper Route - All We Are All Forgotten
Majestico - Boundary Conditions
M83 - Saturdays = Youth
The Helio Sequence - Keep Your Eyes Ahead

time for a missed connection... Friday, October 3, 2008

Missed Connections on Craigslist have been a guilty pleasure of mine since I lived in NYC. The premise is that you caught someone's eye on the subway on the way to work... numerous exchanges of looks... maybe a smile right before you exited the train. Then you kick yourself for not introducing yourself or exchanging emails or asking him/her to coffee.

Well, before Craigslist came along that was all you could do. No longer - now you can post a short witty "message in a bottle" to that stranger in hopes of a miracle.

I'll admit the MC's in NYC are much better than Nashville. More romantic, more poetic and decidely less sleazy. But today I read one that gives me hope for Nashville MC's. But it makes me sad for the poor sap that's missing out on this particularly poetic poster.

Read for yourself and after reading do yourself a favor, don't let a connection be missed. Say hello, say I love you... say something.

We could have been incredible - w4m
Reply to:xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Date: 2008-10-03, 4:43PM CDT

I should have known that when I can't hide behind my words, you don't like what you see. We could have been incredible. We could have been eggs over easy and the warmth of the coffee cup in my hand. We could have been rainy day embraces and that song you sing to on the radio.

All I have is your letters. What will you do now?

saturday night's alright... Sunday, September 7, 2008

Elton was right, Saturday night is alright for fighting, but it is also good for friends and moments of clarity.

I did something "white people" like tonight (minus the dinner-). That's right we had a party, minus the dinner. I normally would say it was just a party except that it had the feeling of a dinner party even though we didn't have dinner.

Anyway, the world famous world traveling Yettons came over and then we were joined by Chrish and Kat York and the Petaja's. What a lovely bunch of people.

Conversation ranged from politics to cereal to Cha-Cha to geometry to ear-candling to 'oh well lots of things'. But the point of this blog is that I remember at one point in the evening making the statement (innocently enough) that since Memphis was born I have not slept in past 10AM once... not once.

After everyone left I got to thinking about that statement and felt like it may have been perceived as a negative one. As if the fact that I am no longer able to sleep in somehow makes life less enjoyable. Well, I'm using this forum to set the record straight. It is true, I get less sleep (to be fair, Meg gets much less sleep than I do). It is also true, I would not trade one million hours of "sleep in's" over a lifetime for the little fella that I get to hang out with on a daily basis.

This simple fact was only made more clear after Memphis woke up in the middle of the night and I had to go into his room and rock him back to sleep. I don't care one bit that I have lost sleep. He is a miraculous little "monster" and he is pure love. Pure love.

I just had to take a picture...

i don't dance enough Tuesday, August 19, 2008

One of my favorite authors, Robert Fulghum, relayed a story about a wedding feast he attended on the island of Crete. He sat on the edge of the dancefloor - the only one not dancing. Finally an older woman came over to him and shared some sage advice that I thank Mr. Fulghum for passing on to me. Mr. Fulghum explained to the kind old grandmother that he did not want to look foolish by dancing a dance he did not know. To which her simple reply was, "Dance or no dance, we will think you foolish. So why not dance and have fun."

So why not dance?

I can't think of a good reason, especially after watching this video (higher quality video here).



If you enjoyed that you must go here and watch the filming of the Huli Wigmen segment.

14 things I was doing while not blogging this week Saturday, August 16, 2008

So it appears that I took a week long vacation from blogging. I'm not sure how that happened. In honor of my return I offer you "7 things I was doing" and "7 things I thought were interesting." Drum roll please!

Things I was doing:
no. 7:. watched more Olympics than I had planned on watching (thanks Meg)
no. 6:. worked (seriously)
no. 5:. watched Heather Headley perform - twice
no. 4:. tried (unsuccessfully) to get snot out of Memphis' nose with one of those blue bulb things
no. 3:. realized how hard it would be to be a single parent (Meg's on a mini-beach vacation)
no. 2:. found a whole new level of respect for single parents (Meg's mini-beach vacation is feeling less "mini" by the minute
no. 1:. held Memphis really tight and tried to kiss his big fat cheeks right off his face

Things I thought were interesting:
no. 7:. this video would be awesome if only John McCain was a weekly football game and not a candidate for President of the United States
no. 6:. wondering why after anxiously awaiting the release of Conor Oberst's first solo record I still haven't purchased it? anyone heard it? thoughts?
no. 5:. wondering what took me so long to buy the Bon Iver album For Emma, Forever Ago
no. 4:. just realized that the beginning of the college football season is only 14 days away - time to dust off those message board logins and passwords
no. 3:. watched an incredible display of olympic greatness
no. 2:. not sure I like the idea of a "faith debate/forum" but will be watching tonight on CNN [editor's note: this is also airing on FOXNews, who is calling it the "Saddleback Showdown" -- tacky!]
no. 1:. and my favorites headline of the year so far: 'Cinderella, others arrested in Disneyland labor protest'

how valuable is experience? Friday, August 8, 2008

A man from Illinois was running for president. His opponents ridiculed him as inexperienced and woefully unprepared. His only governmental experience had been serving in the Illinois state legislature, plus two years as an obscure member of Congress. He had never held an executive or management position of any kind. Yet, this man was elected president of the United States - twice.

His name was Abraham Lincoln. And they said he was unprepared.*

It's easy to dismiss someone by belittling them. However, I do not believe that is a winning or noble strategy. I hope you don't either. I encourage you (and myself) to stop listening to the soundbites and the talking heads that pontificate about the future of our country like sportscasters before the Super Bowl.

Let's actually research the candidates ourselves. Ignore the stump speeches and talking points - look into the candidates detailed plans for America.

It's all online:

Obama - McCain

*courtesy of http://www.moveon.org/

the olympics are coming! the olympics are coming!

I know we are all thinking the same thing. How will the athletes breathe in all that air pollution? How in the name of all that is good did China get the Olympics considering all they do in way of violating almost every human right? When did the TeleTubbies turn into a panda fighting force? Will Michael Phelps win the 753 gold medals he is eligible for? Will Team USA Basketball win the gold and do we care? Will NBC send Al Roker to Beijing broker peace between China and Tibet via the stylings of the NEW Celebrity Family Fued?

So many questions. But leave it to the Onion to ask the most elementary and most important question of all. Is it a trap?

fiction friday no. 3 (poetry edition)

About Fiction Friday: I've decided to set a goal of doing something creative every week. To acheive this goal I'll be writing. Any story that pops into my head. I'll post what I write on (tah-dah) Friday.

today and tomorrow

falls like the turn of teardrops on a sand salty cheek
pools like the puddles of shallow sincerity that keep us
cool and separate in this warm twilight absence of air

christmas light sparkle stars are permanently apart of my eyescape
the sound of children playing in the backyard has become the soundtrack
my depression and exhaltation

lets go lets go lets go lets go
please lets go
hurry hurry hurry stop…
lets go back instead

why do you stare at me so so softly
in slow slow motion with your 70s soft soft lighting

the amber glow feels warm until the channel is changed
and the subscription runs out
and the kids grow up
and the time has come to have the talk we’ve all been dreading

thank you thank you thank you and one more time

thank you
you are loved

top 5 potential nicknames now that favre is a jet Thursday, August 7, 2008

Is the singular of J!-E!-T!-S! really jet? Broadway Joe was a classic in more ways than one, but Broadway Brett just doesn't have the same ring to it. I've come up with a few monikers based on NYC landmarks that could come in handy for the Big Apple media - hey, what about "Big Apple Brett"?

1. Rockefeller Favre (doesn't really convey the blue collar vibe he puts out)
2. Madison Square Favre (geographically doesn't make sense, but has a nice ring.)
3. Bushwick Brett (rap and hip-hop anyone?)
4. Flatiron Favre (the building not the essential emo/scene kid hairstyling tool)
5. East Ruthe-Favre, NJ (let's just give up on a nickname and rename the home of Jets.)

I'd love to hear your suggestions.

one day in the life of... Monday, August 4, 2008

I honestly can't remember if I first read Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich" in high school or in college. I think it was high school, which on a side note reassures me of the quality education I received growing up. In any event, it along with other books and films, opened my eyes to a way of life and struggle that was completely foreign to me, but not necessarily my generation. I thank God for authors like Solzhenitsyn for they shook my reality and chipped away at a anything resembling complacency for mankind that would like to take root in my heart.

Mr. Solzhenitsyn passed away in Moscow last night at 89 years old. There is, fittingly, an 'eye-opening' tribute to him in today's New York Times that addresses the fact that the man that exposed the world to the evils being carried out in the name of Communism is somehow losing relevance in our modern world - even in his native country. Here is a particulary troubling excerpt:

Approached at a park in Moscow, Taisiya Gunicheva, 17, a college student, said she had heard of Mr. Solzhenitsyn, but could not name any of his books.

She said his work was largely absent from her school curriculum. “Can you imagine, there is nothing about it at all,” she said. “It is sad, but unfortunately, it’s true.”

Nearby was Anton Zimin, 26, an advertising copywriter, who said he was quite familiar with Mr. Solzhenitsyn but doubted that others in his generation were. He said people his age have lost touch with the struggles of their parents and grandparents.

“The problem is that now, it’s all about consumption – this spirit that has engulfed everybody,” Mr. Zimin said. “People prefer to consume everything, the simplest things, and the faster, the better. Books are something that force you to think, reading books requires some effort. But they prefer entertainment.”

Andrei V. Vasilevsky, Editor in Chief of the magazine that first published "One Day...", had this to say for a society that no longer sees the need for larger cultural leaders and thinkers. "There is no demand for great people," he said. "I can't say why, but this fact is simply obvious to me. Famous, notable, popular - yes. But not great, in the fullest sense of the world."

In a related note music industry blogger Bob Lefsetz wrote a nice essay challenging the artists of today based on the life of Mr. Solzhenitsyn in his 'Lefsetz Letter' - click the link to read for yourself.