Christian: 1 Me: 0

I want to share a little text message conversation that I had with Christian Plautz (who, incidentally is married to Mary Plautz, with whom I am involved in a savage blog war). Christian not only out-sassed me in a serious way, he also made me realize that I need to learn more computer and internet science.

Me: Can we crash ur lost party 2nite? LOL!
Christian: I left a message on Rochelle's phone. You all are more than welcome to come over.
Me: Pleez use computer spellingz. C U 2nite!
Christian: 10011 101 000101000 11101 010011

Dang man, that is binary code. Just like old times with computers.

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Favorite Album #6

Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, by Wilco. After Wilco presented their new album, recorded in 2001 to their record label, they immediately lost their record deal. Reprise Records execs thought that it was too experimental and that it would not have crossover appeal. To make a long story short, a different division of the same company ended up re-buying the rights to the album and releasing it in 2002. Basically, the record company paid Wilco twice for this record, but it would have been worth it even if they had paid them ONE THOUSAND TIMES!

Basically, this has it all: catchy tunes, funky instrumentation, clever (sometimes surreal) lyrics, and a band that really knows how to rock. From start to finish, this record rules. I have included some links for you to consider how great Wilco is. Rock on.


The first track of the album, "I Am Trying to Break Your Heart"...
Wilco - 01 I Am Trying To Break Your Heart.mp3


Here is Wilco, performing "War on War"



And here is a slightly scruffier Wilco, performing "I'm the Man Who Loves You"

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Vacation

Dear Internet,
I picked a bad time for a vacation. I have timed out of several games on chess.com and I am falling behind in the posting contest. I am sorry for all of the disappointment this has caused. I am disappointed in myself. I will get back into the swing of things soon.

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OH, IT'S ON NOW!!!!!

Hello internet, I have been e-slapped in the e-face and I am not going to take it! Mary wrote on her e-blog that she has a goal to have more posts than me by the end of the year! My initial reaction to this feeling was hunger; I wanted some chips and salsa. Immediately after that, I was flabbergasted - how dare she? Then, I went back to hungry and got my chips and salsa. (For anyone who's interested, I like Jack's Special Salsa. It's not very spicy, but it has a bold flavor, as if to say, "I'm not the toughest guy on the block, but I'm friendly and it's worth talking to me because I have a lot of good stories and a clever sense of irony." You know...that kind of salsa!) Please, Payola!

Anyway, I have some news for you, Mary. It doesn't take much to challenge me to a posting contest. It does, however, require some serious bloggin' chops to best me in a contest of internet prolificacy (<- real word, even though SPELL CHECK DOESN'T THINK IT IS A REAL WORD!) What I'm saying is, BRING IT ON, MARY, but only if you are prepared to make over One Million posts, because that is what it's going to take to win!

Side note: I just read Mary's post and I guess it really never says anything about a contest, but whatever, I'm going to take it personally and get huffy about it. I would also be willing to add a little wager to this contest...somewhere in the neighborhood of one million dollars. Mary, if you're reading, let me know if you want to take this one million dollar bet. If this does turn into an extremely high stakes posting war, we'll establish some ground rules because there are a lot of questions that haven't been addressed about how competitive blogging works (minimum word count per post, how much original content is required, quality of post v. quantity of posts, what is the role of copy and paste, what about youtube, images, etc.)

So, I will keep posting about my favorite records (albeit, one album per post, now that I have an interest in bumping up my post count) until I hear back from Mary. Who's your money on?

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Favorite Records: #8 & #7 (updated)

Transfomer, by Lou Reed. Lou Reed began his career as the leader of The Velvet Underground. His solo career has been rather erratic (see, Metal Machine Music) but any failures of shortcomings should be forgiven if only because this is the guy who wrote and recorded Transformer. The album was produced by David Bowie, so it doesn't sound like The Velvet Underground at all. Instead it is a collection of simple, fun songs that have been fancied up by David Bowie's slick production. My favorite song of the album: "Satellite of Love".

Lou Reed - Satellite Of Love




Kid A, by Radiohead. with this album, Radiohead went from being the best rock band on the planet to the BEST BAND PERIOD on the planet (To the best of my knowledge they are also better than any band from the moon). After trading in their electric guitars and drumkits for synthesizers, laptops, and a rhodes piano, Radiohead locked themselves away in a recording studio and FREAKED OUT! I remember the first time I heard this record. It was a semi-religious experience. The muted, reverberating synth, the glitchy, manipulated vocals, and the crystal clear melody of the first track, "Everything In It's Right Place", basically changed my life! Here is the song with the music video. (Note: there are catchier songs on the record, but I love this one.)



THE NATIONAL ANTHEM, by Radiohead

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Record #9: Rain Dogs

Imagine if a hobo, an assassin, and a jazz pianist were to write music together. They would probably come up with something sort of like Rain Dogs. This album is creepy, catchy, and beautiful at once. Also, fans of Rod Stewart will be happy to hear the original version of "Downtown Train", which Stewart went on to re-record and make popular. Listen to this record. I beg of you.

Rod Stewart version:


Tom Waits version:


Another Tom Waits song from this album, just for kicks:

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Top Ten Favorite Records: 10

Everyone likes advice. Especially, unsolicited advice. But, too bad - you're getting my music recommendations anyway. So, I am going to write posts about my top ten favorite records. I don't mean these to be the TEN BEST, just my own personal favorites. You will notice that there isn't anything extremely recent (i.e., last 5 years) on the list. That's not because there haven't been great albums lately, (on the contrary, there's been a lot of great music), but because I still don't know how they'll stand the test of time. So, these aren't in any special order, but here they are. If you want to listen to these records, I highly recommend them!

10. The Moon and Antartica by, Modest Mouse:


Fast & Slow, Rowdy & Subdued, Angry & Poignant. This album basically has it all. In their weird, did-someone-forget-to-tune-the-guitar kind of way, Modest Mouse nailed it on this album. If your only experience with Modest Mouse is turning on your radio to hear the ubiquitous, "Float On" - then you still haven't heard this band at it's best.



Heard the album? What do you think? Comments below.

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Green

I've decided that I need spice up this blog a little bit. So, I'm making it green. Not green in the eco-friendly sense. I'm talking about regular green. Also, I think I'm going to change the layout back to how it was. This blog is now much too wide for anyone's good. Have a good day, and enjoy the green letters. They are more fun than ordinary letters.

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Job Hunting

The worst thing in the world is looking for a job. If anyone on the internet wants to hire me as a personal assistant, I would appreciate it. The problem is since I lost a game of chess to John, I am really needing to make much money. My interviews:


Them: So, let's talk about compensation.
Me: Right.
Them: We usually start people off at $10.00 per hour.
Me: The thing is, I might end up owing my friend a million dollars, so I was really hoping to earn somewhere in the $1,000.00 per hour range.
Them: That's more than I make.
Me: N.M.P. (not my problem)
Them: I don't think we can offer you this position at that wage.
Me: Oh, that's real BOOTSY (said sarcastically).
-------------------------------------------------------------
Them: But we can offer you $975.00 per hour. Is that okay?
Me: $975.00 per? Flip that Diggie!!

All the stuff below the dotted line is imaginary and will never happen.

Also, this image comes up when you Google job hunt. I agree with everything it says except that the only job that makes me jump like that is one that will help me escape the crushing weight of my chess debt.

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UPDATE!

John is going to beat me in our Chess rematch...

I don't know what the legal and financial implications of this are, but if anyone has some cash they'd like to donate to help offset the tremendous cost of losing a game of chess, I would appreciate it. I'd prefer donations of $100,000 or more, but anything helps.

So, the series will soon be tied at 1-1. We're trying to decide if we're going to go best out of a thousand, or what. Either way, this is a sad day for a man who used to call himself half as good as Bobby Fischer.

Also, if you google the word "sad", this is one of the first pictures that comes up. I think this might be the saddest thing.

[edit] John forced me to write this. I wanted to just pretend that this loss never happened. I hope you're happy, John. [/edit]

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"Flip that Diggie!"

Have you ever been around other people? Have you ever been to school or had a job? If so, you are probably familiar with the concept of catchphrases. Basically, a catchphrase is something clever that someone once said that other people then repeat for comedic effect. So, here are a few existing catchphrases as well as a few that I am proposing.

EXISTING CATCHPHRASES

"I'll Be Back" -- This phrase comes from the TERMINATOR movie. Basically, it's a permanent joke because people have to sat these exact words all the time.

"Whassup!?" -- This phrase comes from a series of Budweiser commercials which aired from 1999 to 2002 in which some guys yell "Whassup!?" to each other and America laughs. For basically the next five or so year any period of silence, no matter how brief, was likely to be broken by someone yelling "WHASSUP!?" Everyone would then laugh and high five each other.

"I'm Rick James B----" -- Dave Chappelle is an aberration. He is both riotously funny and responsible for one of the most annoying catchphrases of my lifetime. Beginning in the summer of 2004, you could bet that if you spoke to a college undergrad, he (or she, but especially he) would, at some point in the converstation, exclaim, "I'm Rick James B----". Here is a sample conversation:
You: "Hi. Could you tell me where the student center is?"
Him: "The Student Center or the Student Recreation Center?"
You: "I'm not sure. I have tickets to a play. Which one would that be in?"
Him: "You'll want the Student Center. Just follow this sidewalk. It'll be on your left."
You: "Thanks. I appreciate your help."
Him: "You're welcome." Pauses. "Also, I'm Rick James, B----!"


PROPOSED CATCHPHRASES

"Flip that Diggie" -- This phrase means something like, "Yes, with enthusiasm". So, when you want to say "yes" but with a little extra gusto, you can say "Flip that Diggie". Example:
You: "I'm hungry. You want to eat?"
Friend: "Yeah. Want to go to Taco Bell and slam some crunchies?"
You: "Flip that Diggie!"
Friend: "Bootsy!"

"Bootsy" -- Means the same thing as "Awesome!".

"Dub Nugz" -- Means the same thing as "Bootsy."





Next time we'll look at buzzwords.

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An Illustrated Primary Election Poem, or rather, A Series of Rhymes

Barak,
Iraq,
Jacques Chirac.


Clinton,
San Quentin State Prison,
Free Robot Lovin'.

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An Amazing Hair

1) Yes, that is a helicopter on her head.
2) What else can really be said about it?
3) Nothing. Nothing more can be said about it.

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A Terrible Beard

Apparently, David Beckham thinks he is too cool to not look like he's homeless! I know I probably shouldn't be the one to criticize since I tend to have a little scruff going on, but seriously. This guy probably has the most ridiculous facial hair patterns I have ever seen.

[inspiration] wait...maybe that is not the way his beard grows naturally, maybe he styled it that way...after all, he did basically invent the faux-hawk, maybe he's trying something new with facial hair. [/inspiration]

Anyway, when I saw this picture I couldn't take my eyes off of it (great, you noticed, he's not wearing a shirt in this picture, thats not why I was so enthralled) because that facial hair is downright grizzly. I just don't know what to say. This facial hair is almost as gross as the sideburns that these guys have.

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