The Year in Music

So here's a list of the albums that I bought (or otherwise procured) over the past year. Not as much as past years, not by a longshot. A lot of soundtracks, I see, and my rate of consumption of JPop has gone down a bit (for one thing, they're even more expensive this year, thanks to the weakening dollar). And this was definitely the year I discovered Frank Zappa. I rounded out my Laurie Anderson collection, although I still have yet to either replace or remaster my vinyl collection of United States Live. And there's still my bubblegum pop collection highlighted by Tatu, Alizee, Aya Matsuura, and SweetS, which replaced last year's Mirai.

A couple of micro-reviews: Her Space Holiday's The Young Machines was probably the best album I bought all year, a thoughtful collection of pop-angst, with The Secret Machine's Now Here is Nowhere coming in a close second with its hard riffs playing on clever lyrics, but the album I listened to death was The Art of Noise's live album, Reconstructed For Your Pleasure. Artful, diverse, and thematic, The Art of Noise hasn't stopped improving. Rasputina is merely gimmicky, VNV is background music, and Yoko Kanno (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex) is a god among men.

( The List )

The New Roman Century

When President Nixon nominated G. Harrold Carswell to the Supreme Court, he was rejected by the Senate. One of the more damning indictments was a statement from the American Bar Association that Carswell's legal opinions were, at best, mediocre.

Senator Roman L. Hruska (immortalized in the song "Dead Puppies Aren't Much Fun") rose to Carswell's defense, saying, "Even if he was mediocre, there are a lot of mediocre judges and people and lawyers. They are entitled to a little representation, aren't they?"

I was reminded of Hruska today as I read in the New York Times the following:

Whatever the roots of Mr. Bush's overriding devotion to loyalty, it partly stems from his disdain for the concerns of old-style meritocrats, the kind of people who wince when the president places his confidence in someone like Mr. Kerik. Mr. Bush has never been comfortable in America's so-called meritocracy. Undistinguished in college, business school and in the private sector, he spent nearly 30 years sitting in seminar rooms and corporate suites while experts and high achievers held forth.

Now it appears that he's having his revenge - speaking loudly in his wave of second-term cabinet nominations for a kind of anti-meritocracy: the idea that anyone, properly encouraged and supported, can do a thoroughly adequate job, even better than adequate, in almost any endeavor.

Read it all.

Service nowadays...

I didn't bring lunch to work today, so I wandered out into the street to get a little walking time and find something to eat. I eventually ended up circumnavigating the neighborhood, passing by a tall man in a Sonics jacket wearing a green-and-yellow fright wig, and another man who mumbled as he walked and looked menacingly at everyone that moved, before I found the Safeway, wandered in and bought a cup of soup and some cut fresh pineapple.

Whatever happened to people who could pack a grocery bag? You do not put hot soup and "keep refrigerated" fruit right next to each other. Once upon a time, supermarkets actually trained their salesclerks, who had a lot of other things to do since they had no computers or bar-code readers, to think about how to pack a grocery bag.

Still, for four bucks, I suppose I shouldn't complain.

I have also developed a preference for Uni-ball Jetstream pens, which have a new ink formula that's smooth but quick-drying and I've really been enjoying it. Unfortunately, I've also lost two Jetstreams in a row, and now the office supply stores I rely on are sold out. I'll just have to wait.

And this morning I heard those sweet words, "And we'll see you tomorrow. This is the end of Lesson 56." Huzzah. Only 34 lessons to go and then I'll need a new source of Japanese goodness.

Short-term burnout

Okay, I know, this is generally not an angsty blog. I try to be chipper. I try to be productive without succumbing to exaggerated expectations. I just can't seem to do it this week.

Dunno why. I had a silly idea that would have produced a good setting for a couple of stories, but I can't seem to wrap my head around anything coherent. (Learned an awful lot about the construction, maintenence, and general utility of gondolas, though. Don't ask.) I can't seem to visualize anything that I want to draw, either. I hacked on a couple of programs that make parts of my life easier, and I've been getting better about my projects and tasks daily and weekly reviews.

I've been here before. And I'll get out of it again. It's just the sum total stresses of life. I'll recover eventually. In the meantime, I apologize for the, um, down time.

An observation from the gaping void

I've been reading Gaping Void, a blog by a "creative director" in advertising who actually has some worthwhile things to say. And one of the things he calls Pillar Management says, basically, "The more talented you are, the less you need props."

And I kinda realized where it applies. He asks, "Why are there so many hack writers with state-of-the-art laptops?" I don't have a state-of-the-art laptop; I have a hunk of reliable steel that's five years old and still chugging away. On the other hand, I have great blank sketchbooks and expensive mechanical pencils, and I still can't draw worth a damn. (Part of the problem, I suspect, is that I like drawing naked people, which is not something I can do around my kids, and so I don't put much time and effort into it. I don't want to draw things that don't interest me.)

Speaking of great creativity, Ferry Hamlim has a new free game, High Delivery. I hope you're as charmed by this man's simple brilliance and elegance as I am.