shenanigans

well it has been a while but it was nearly about to be a whole lot longer. yesterday featured a computer crisis of sorts. it started at school when i went in for a review session; computer would be all plugged in and then somehow nonetheless lose all power. i figured something wasn't plugged in right, messed around for a minute, and it was fine. went home and it kept doing the same thing, getting progressively more and more touchy. i made the mistake of letting all the power run out before i grabbed everything i needed off of it. fortunately, i was able to get it to charge up by pinning the notebook against myself and firmly pressing the ac power connector thing into the jack. problematic, but i managed to run the power up to about 20% of the battery; enough time to get things off it should i need to. given the nature of the problem, i was reasonably certain that the power supply was the offending piece in the puzzle. i wasn't happy about the prospect of buying one, but better to buy a power supply than have to send my computer off for four weeks to get repaired while i kind of need it to study for/take my exams. so buy a power supply it was.
or it was supposed to be. i walked to a nearby computer refurbishing sort of place and explained my situation. the clerk took my laptop and immediately stuck a small screwdriver in the ac jack and wiggled it around, claiming the jack was loose and that was my problem, not the power supply. i wanted to plug a different power supply in to see if it would work, but they were not having it. the original clerk handed off to someone who seemed more in charge and he repeated the process with a pen instead of the screwdriver. told me it would have to bee opened up, very costly he said. well, shit. i wasn't about to shell out for all that cause the computer has a warranty that would cover it. at least i had charged it up, i figured, can always get what i need even if i have to send it off someplace and try and find a way to make due during a time where making due is not an ideal approach; something more is required. but i didn't have a lot of options. i went back home and called the circuit city number on my warranty, which was about as far from helpful as could even be imagined. every path through the automatic routing left me with some other 800 number. the hell with it, i figured. the warranty type lists it as 'walk in' so no matter what i find out, i obviously need to walk into a circuit city someplace at some point. so find a circuit city i was. luckily i do have some driving friends out here, and they were good enough to get me way out to the northeast of the city where the closest circuit city was.
after some minor traffic/directional confusion (the roads up there are all fuckin' slanty, you know, like lake drive in gun rue, no perpendicular intersections at all) we found the place. i busted out the computer again and made my case, this time explaining i believed the problem was with the jack as i had been told. the clerk, who did a good job, immediately rustled up the appropriate jack adapter to test for power over a the power supply he had at the desk. much to my delight, the lights came on - it was the power supply after all. that is the good news. the bad news is that yeah, the jack is kind of loose, but it is sure as hell working for now. also, i still had to buy a new power supply for the time being. the warranty actually covered my power supply though, so they are ordering me a new one, and when it comes in i get that one for free and i can allegedly return the one i had to drop $130 on. this is a good thing. so fingers crossed that the jack doesn't wind up failing me in the middle of an exam. i think i'll be alright. even if that did happen, the exam set-up is designed to handle it i think. i don't know. and i hope i don't find out, really.
so i am home and so is my dear computer. i felt excruciatingly crippled while it was not working. i didn't even know what to do with myself while i killed time waiting for my ride. played some records and some wii, so i guess i got by. but i do realize how dependent on this thing i am. so it goes. in addition for all the enjoyment it provides me, it is also the site of the ongoing battle of the procedure known as civil. that is my first exam. the upside is that we didn't cover half the amount of material we probably did in say con law, but what we did do in civ pro is disgustingly arcane and dry. super dry. dry like trying to eat a dozen saltines in under a minute with no water. apt analogy in that both rapid saltine consumption and civ pro are serious choking hazards. i should check the inside cover of my textbook, i bet it has a warning about not being left near children. warning - book is not a toy. although mine kind of looks like it was used as a soccer ball at some point. note to self - a used book costs the same no matter how used it is or is not. i have probably seen the last of used books for my tenure in legal education though; maybe a couple for the small number of big classes i wind up in, but i hope to mostly be in classes small enough that no one has bothered publishing a book for them. some of them will probably have skinny books that get reprinted every year though, and those will indeed be costly. so much to look forward to.
in other news, i am done with drum. had it, totally. they changed the cut of the tobacco a while ago, and it is my personal belief (rooted in sufficient experience) that not only does it not hand-roll as well, but it also causes it to dry out quicker. as some of you may know, shortly after pouch tobacco dries, it inevitably gets pulverized into tobacco powder. not an advisable source of nicotine. so fuck you drum. you chased me away with your fifty as opposed to sixty papers and pandering to the machine-roll crowd. today, though, i didn't even have any halfzware options (language note - halfzware is dutch and means "half-heavy"). not even (shudder) bali. so i went with samson bright blend, which is essentially, i dunno, quarter heavy? reminds me of american spirit roll in aroma, but is dissimilar in a superior manner to other aspects of said roll. no updates for a week or two, and this is what i have to tell you. i bet it is really tough to get a job as a tobacconist these days. probably you have to be a cigar person, and i'll pass on that business. one of the guys i know from drexel law did that for a few years, maybe i will ask him about employment projections in the tobacco sector.
i am hoping to make it to baltimore this weekend for the kinetic sculpture race. originally i had hoped to go down early and catch hot buttered rum, a pretty good SF bluegrass band. people we know play in an exceptionally entertaining band called hoots and hellmouth (gah i feel dirty linking to myspace), and they are opening and could possibly get us guest list spots. this, however, was before i lost a day's worth of study time to the whole ordeal with the power supply, so we shall see. mostly now i am hoping to make it down there at all, and i suspect that i will, for good or ill. i will of course let y'all know how it turns out. it is things like that where i really wish i had a camera, because guaranteed there is gonna be some cool stuff to see. i'm sure plenty of other people feel the same and have cameras though, so the event will be more than adequately documented. philly is trying to start their own up in kensington this year, and i would like to see that as well and compare the two. also want to get to kensington to check out yards or philadelphia brewing company; i can never remember how that split worked out and who wound up where with what building and who is brewing what on the other's premises. anyway, should be a good time. i believe it is also my sister's birthday then. also, the first day after my last exam. yes, good times in the works. now to make it from here to there.
i did manage to squeeze in quite an evening's entertainment this past friday as well. for all the things i like about my go-to watering hole, i usually do not intentionally go there to see a band. this was the exception. phish cover band i had heard good things about. say what you will, but i certainly had a hell of a time. i have heard quite a few bands play there, and the sound has never been better. they were pretty tight and really focused, did a great job executing some of the trickier moments in what they played. i guess it was the bass player's first real show with them, but the dude could have fooled me. not overbearing, but always solid and audible in the mix. last friday was also my last day of class, so the show was really towards the end of what served as plenty of a self-congratulatory afternoon. for all of that, i could probably give you a set list from memory. just can't help myself sometimes.
my employment prospects have recently improved from none at all to something i would like to do that i might actually get to do. just a research assistant gig for one of my profs, but i really like the stuff he works on and we had a pretty good talk the other day. sounds like he would actually have plenty of work for me to do, which is also a plus since some research assistant jobs at law schools do not involve quite so scholarly a professor. i was glad our discussion went well though because i have not gone out of my way to make waves in property, which is what i have him for. on the other hand, i have had the answer whenever he calls on me, so that bodes well. he is always trying to pull something, asking me when he catches me yawning or looking otherwise possibly disengaged. no man, i'm there, i'm just not going to waste everyone's time with what i think. we have plenty of other people doing that already. oh, and check this shit out. a couple of other people naturally put in an app of some sort with this professor for this gig. one of them happens to be that voice-like-nails-on-a-chalkboard harpy who has plagued my education all year. here is the best part though: that bitch ALREADY HAS a fucking research assistant job with another prof. i know because one of my friends also already has a similar job, and they all had some orientation thing recently, which is how i found out yet another factor in this broad's rampant douchebaggery. this really takes the cake. my friend shows me an email send to the listserv for the people who have these sorts of jobs this summer, and sticking out of the list like some lighthouse of annoyance is this chick's email address in all caps. i shit you not. all caps. no one else puts one capital in their whole address. i just keep telling myself that other law schools i could have gone to probably have even more of her. what the hell, people.
speaking of which, one more thing. this story is one of those things that is so egregious one cannot help but have a few things to say. i have to say, thanks bureaucracy (man did i have tough time spelling that). way to suck like you are supposed to. nothing is ever anyone's fault. sorry ma'am, i have orders -- i could lose my job. and i can't lose my job, so you are losing your kid. if you still didn't read the story, you should. it is about a professor at u of m who bought his seven year old a mike's hard lemonade at a baseball game because he didn't know there was such a product as lemonade with alcohol. it gets better from there. always does.
straw is still really freaked out about some fireworks that went off like twenty minutes ago, and so i am going to call it good here and try to soothe him. i can't blame him; they caught me just as off-guard.

i read the news today, oh boy

news, that is, of the haircut! and oh boy, indeed. great stuff. definitely dig the packaging/presentation as well, very cool. news of the haircut is a great title, but if i was gonna pull one line out of the whole package it might be sweet jesus on a lazy susan. it is not as good of a title, but damn if i don't love it. if anyone is confused, news of the haircut is peter berghoef's (witte piet under my links) latest publication. mr. berghoef is royalty of holland mi, proprietor of the berghoefer bavarian resort, and inaugural poet laureate of my country. he may or may not whup everyone's ass at scrabble tonight. stooges!?
yesterday was a beautiful day. a beautiful day to get sunburned. i observed a rather large-scale free mumia rally. it was by far the best-attended event i have observed, which is kind of cool and kind of strange. naturally, it was also the most diverse. all ages, all races, lots of different organizations represented (lgbt for freeing mumia included). also the best rhythm section i've ever seen at something like this. things went slowly, but without a serious hitch. i was kind of nervous about the rig they had set up for sound: at the front of the march was a pickup with a pa and speakers, which was too much to for the vehicle to power on its own, so they had a generator. the generator, however, was gasoline powered and in the back of a minivan behind the pickup, so there was an extension cord from the generator to the pa in the truck. it all worked out in the end. there was a small counter-demonstrating contingent, but they had as many police for as them for a line between the demonstrators and their counterparts. everyone was well-behaved for the most part; officers hauled one or two people off to the side with harsh reprimands; people who had caught the march along its route and were hassling participants. the officers were interested in keeping the peace, and they did a good job. really commendable work considering they were assigned to guard people demanding the release of a person many of them probably believed murdered one of their co-workers. it takes a lot of patience to guard people who are berating you and your work over loudspeakers. probably the most extreme freedom of speech i have witnessed: talking shit on the founding fathers over the pa in front of independence hall. anyway, we were out there a long time, and i have some hilarious sunburn. my face is ok because of the neon green baseball hats we wear, but my neck is another story. my head looks like it was poorly photoshopped onto my body. there is also a funny break in the burn down my spine where my ponytail was.
i read a fantastic graphic novel the other day called three fingers. i blew through it pretty quick, but i might read it again and spend more time looking at the artwork. it is set in a universe akin to the one in roger rabbit, where the toons are actual beings who act in pictures. but this is way darker. everything is told sort of obliquely, to avoid copyright infringement, but you can tell what the idea is supposed to be. mickey mouse = ricky rat, and so forth. the basic gist is that ricky rat was the first successful toon film actor, and he had three fingers from a birth defect. when he gets big, other toons try to get in on the act, but none are nowhere near as successful. the superstitious toon community chalks it up to ricky's having three fingers, and toons begin to get fingers amputated in an effort to bring good luck. it seems to work, as after the practice starts other toons begin to gain comperable fame, but only those with three fingers. the whole novel is set forth in sort of a documentary fashion set decades down the line, with different figures weighing in on whether the film studios invented/encouraged/condoned the practice. pretty friggin excellent overall.
i also indulged in a film the other night, which was also quite entertaining. quirky movie called fido. set in like 50s america after a massive zombie war. the idea is at some point an electronic collar was developed that quells the natural zombie appetite for human flesh and now zombies are used for manual labor and kept as servants/house pets. pretty well put together flick, only one questionable plot point, but very entertaining and intriguing stuff altogether. i don't think it was even more than 90 minutes long, but they got enough characters in to offer a few perspectives on what the movie was trying to get at. set design and makeup were top notch. given that i hadn't ever heard of it, it still must have had a pretty decent budget. i don't know if anyone famous was in it, because i am bad at knowing those sorts of things. in any event, it is a good movie to watch because it is both thought-provoking and amusing. i am a sucker for excursions into contemporary conceptions of 50s era america/americana. some seriously bangin' tunes on the soundtrack that i was unfamiliar with too, which is always a bonus.
earlier in the weekend, i experienced something for the first time in several years: being at a party the cops put the kibosh on. it really didn't seem likely for most of the party, but on the other hand i got there kind of early. i didn't really meet anyone, but there were several people who i already knew there. the party was mostly work-based, and so the vast majority of people who showed up knew each other and probably didn't plan on branching out much. in any event, it was a pretty good time. good music, good company, good amount of beer, even if the beer itself is not overwhelming on its own. nothing wrong with it either, though. we took our own carling black label, but there was a healthy amount of pabst in the fridge as well. i also ate lightly salted potato chips for the first time. i don't recall ever seeing those back home, but every brand out here definitely includes lightly-salted in its line. they're not all bad, mostly just taste more like whatever oil they are cooked in. anyway, the cops showed up at some point, and were there for so long that there were two separate occasions where i fully believed they had left but in reality they had not. the good news is that no one was ticketed for anything as far as i am aware. really, though, even after everyone got there (i think a lot of people got out of work at midnight or so) it wasn't all that wild and crazy. the small back porch was completely packed, but it still couldn't have been all that loud. i guess it only takes one noise complaint sometimes. this party featured a boston terrier, for which i was thankful. damn was she excited. much to my surprise while attempting to locate the restroom, two more boston terriers had also shown up. i like to think that they were friends of the dog and the dog invited them; none of the humans brought the other two along. because hey, if dogs can pull that off, my cats should be more than capable of the same.

this type of shit calls for bay and thyme...

in case you somehow missed this recent mts, you probably shouldn't have. i was gonna post it but i put in the html thing from the site and it doesn't fit right on the blog, so link it is. pretty money comic if you ask me, up there with the failure to protect the neck one, which is probably still my favorite.
and that is the only notable news i have. naw, not quite, but nothing earth shattering. let me see, i've done some really good porch sitting. that is indeed a pastime i am rather fond of. they had the flea market again, but there weren't as many places with vast record selections this time. that is not to say that there still weren't way more records i wanted than i could afford, but it is to say that i didn't get anything i went to find. i really wanted after the gold rush, and some wannabe hipster (spell check does not mark either of those two words) fuck pulled it out of one of the two remaining boxes i hadn't pawed through after flipping through thousands of lps. and he handed it to his even more wannabe friend and advised him to pick it up. i was displeased. the good news is that the stand with the best records was actually just a field operation of the record store like five or six blocks away, and i bet they have at least one more copy back there, i just have to go. still. i thought about seeing if the dude would trade me for the original press t-rex electric warrior i found, but even my relatively minimal experience with record supplies led me to believe i should just hold what i had. ah well. i also failed to find a copy of ANY steely dan album i wanted. i couldn't even find any of the ones i had. what gives? i really need the royal scam. get along, kid charlamagne. in addition to the t-rex, i scored nice copies of john wesley harding (now playing), american beauty, obscured by clouds (can finally retire my other beat-to-shit copy), and allmans live at the fillmore east, which has that excellent side of whipping post. all this for thirty bucks or so, more or less a successful experience.
i got some brief legal observing in the other day. strange little event undoubtedly inspired by that improv group everyone is going on about who did the thing at grand central and the cell phone symphony. this was along the lines of the grand central thing, having people freeze and stuff, but kind of on a small scale. also, 30th street station in philly is not really comparable to grand station. but they still had like 30-35 people participating. mostly older women, nice folks. at 530 everyone stopped mid-motion for five minutes, and at the strike of 535 they all started chanting "stop funding war". it was kind of funny; there were about five cops in the big room we were in and only one of them noticed the freeze, and he only went and talked to this guy filming and had him stop. once the chant started, they garnered more attention (and a little applause from the uninvolved) and a "move along now" from the cops. no real conflict, i imagine the officers didn't mind having something to do for a couple minutes and talk about for a while. beats dealing with the recent rash of random subway platform assaults by groups of teens anyway.
today i read over sixty pages of case law on affirmative action in education. the interesting thing when dealing with a few cases on the topic decided by courts of slowly changing makeup is the predictability of the results and arguments advanced. onerous as it is to feel the repetitious nature of similar cases, it gives a really definite impression of how the jurisprudence develops and applies even within the SCOTUS world of arcane distinctions and pick-and-choose stare decisis. so if you have any questions about the university of michigan's admission schemes for undergrad and law school, let me know. cases on such contentious subjects also produce markedly fractured opinions, so i get to read a majority or a plurality, and then a couple concurrences, and a dissent or two. the real development of the day is that i actually almost agreed with thomas, the bane of my con law reading. that guy has to write separately for absolutely every damn case. i would have to do some serious digging to find a majority opinion by him that wasn't a unanimous ruling. anyway, he actually took the majority to serious task for once instead of just going on and on about the intent of the framers. good change for me, i'm sure no one else cares.
the damn wings are fucking up right now. the nhl playoffs are the most arduous of any sport i know of, and have provided me with compelling entertainment, but sometimes it is just too much. theoretically, a team could play as many games in the playoffs as it does in an entire third of the regular season. pretty wild. anyway, i hope they get it together. the idea is to play closer to a sixth of a season in the playoffs than a third. at least the tigers are starting to get their shit together.
what else... watched rain man for the first time the other night. i did not regret it. somewhat unbelievable, but hey, it is a movie after all. tom cruise is such an asshole. dustin hoffman really did do a bang-up job in that; he wasn't in charge of the plot flaws. not a bad flick for a night in, i was staying home to save money for the flea market. money money money. never stops.
i got a call from a friend today letting me know his son was born the other night. good to hear from him, and i'm glad for him and his wife, but man, that is way more money than i care to think about. my buddy is currently taking the bus to his job, two hours each way. the grass might not always be greener on the other side of the fence after all, but it is at least different. no one wins; we all have our own shit to deal with. right now my shit involves going to bed, i guess.

rule against perpetuities

a word as questionable as "perpetuities" is typically indicative of something bound to be a pain in the ass. suggestions from the prof and the text that this is indeed the case pretty much seals the deal. however, the difficulty was really overstated. yes, it is dense and antiquated, but it is really more of a bullshit hassle than it is impenetrable. the real annoyance is the dozen-odd categories of interests. fee simple subject to open. vested remainder. possibility of reverter. and so on. the only good part about all that is the prof teaches in reference to what he calls the plane of time. makes sense, but he talks about people getting pushed off of the plane of time, and that cracks me up. the notion of snakes on a plane of time really got me going. coming this summer, starring my property prof and samuel l. jackson.
another humorous moment from class: a different prof has recently had occasion to refer to wanton negligence, a specific legal concept. but he pronounces it like wonton. wonton negligence, something we should all do our best to avoid. my friend was walking out of the room for something when he said it, and while she was gone i leaned over and typed "wonton negligence" in her notes. she came back and caused a minor disruption. it was pretty funny. but don't worry, law school still sucks ass and i still hate it. we laugh because it hurts.
over the weekend i finally made it to the famed italian market for the first time. more properly, it should be called the multi-ethnic market; the only italian thing about it was the names of all the butcher shops. saw some pretty crazy shit hanging in those windows, such as a score of whole skinned rabbits. lots of odd fish chunks. suspicious sausages. it was fun to walk around, and they have a lot of things for very cheap. like seriously cheap. we stopped into dibruno bros. because it was there, and damn if i didn't have some of the best cheese ever. one was this estate cheddar where every ingredient was from some big old-school pastoral farm in rural england. the other was a stilton that couldn't be called a stilton because of some law saying a cheese cannot be called stilton if made with raw milk. so it was called stichelton or something, which is supposedly a more accurate historical moniker. in any event, that one was out of this world. it owned my palate for like twenty minutes after a meager bite, so delicious and lingering. pretty damn bold. i didn't pick up anything due to sheer sticker shock. granted, the shit was amazing, but i cannot as yet handle paying for cheese somewhere in the over thirty dollars a pound range. hopefully someday. but damn if it isn't worth every penny.
other recent experiences have featured my preferred dive. i had a notion to make it in there at some point on friday, but at nearly one a.m. i still hadn't made it down there. no matter, we still went and made the most of it, probably more than was necessary. i've never envied anyone whose job it was to get people out of a bar at close, but apparently no one at this bar has that job. no one even asked us to leave. we still had plenty of beer since we got served somewhere near the vicinity of closing. didn't make it out until three or so, but no one seemed put out about it. excellent. last night was my first realization of a special i believed to be apocryphal. the legendary ten dollars for all you can eat wings and all you can drink beer for two hours. bargains galore. made the most of that too, although i almost wish i hadn't. didn't overdo the wings because i didn't get any until i had kicked back a few foamy pints. i couldn't pass up a deal like this. it wouldn't be true to my heritage. all in all, a good time. that bar has been nothing but good to me since i showed up, and i remain appreciative.
shit, have i mentioned i can see again? i have new glasses and they are excellent. to the casual observer, they are not a notable departure from my previous pair. that is alright by me, because i liked those just fine. but there are differences, and i feel these are more structurally sound, and that is certainly a good thing. the first day i had them, i was almost content to do almost nothing but look around and be able to recognize things again. don't know what you've got 'til it's gone, ya know.
i have continued to listen to music i haven't heard or have written off previously, but have switched from the stack of records to stuff on the archive. i won't bore you with all the details, but i was not grossly mistaken about the vast majority of bands i had written off. the one i was the most sure about not liking was the one i actually liked the best. i hadn't heard all that much of their stuff before, but i still think they have one of the dumbest names for a band i have ever heard: perpetual groove. that is almost as bad as improvised freedom. but they're pretty good, leaning to the typical livetronica of most current "jam bands" but with a definite steely dan influence, which adds a nice adjustment. what i've been enjoying the most, though, was an extra download i made of the front guy solo acoustic. i have been doing a lot of that kind of stuff recently, digging on the jeff tweedy solo, trevor from tea leaf, and now this. i don't know if that means i'm getting old or turning into a pansy or what, but i like that stripped down sound sometimes. from metal to solo acoustic in six years.

so i smacked him in the face and downed another carling

it isn't quite the same thing as the real deal (although i doubt it could be that different), but black label is becoming my new cheap beer. maybe. i don't know. pbr holds a place in my heart, always has, always will. but black label ain't bad and the price is certainly reasonable. also, i get to haul 24 cans around instead of 30 at a time. doesn't seem like it should make that much of a difference, but hey, you walk a few blocks with a thirty pack and see how it goes. i guess we've all probably carried roughly that amount at some point though. well, whatever, hooray black label. way to be cheap.
the only better deal i got this week was on this stack of records sitting next to me. you guessed it, they were free. i know a few people with too many records. this bunch looks pretty decent, and he didn't make me take all he wanted to get rid of, so i had some choice. i mostly have things i've heard of or have heard before, with a couple other things thrown in for fun, just because they looked interesting. i forget the whole story about this vinyl, but i remember that my friend somehow obtained roughly a pickup bed's worth of assorted stuff from some dude a couple years ago. mostly dead-related. no dead records in my part of the haul, of course; that isn't the sort of thing people give away. several records, however, on which members of the dead play. also, keith and donna's album that came out when round records was still going. has a picture of their baby on the front, and it is one of the most unhappy looking babies i have seen who is not crying. i am curious to hear it and all the other stuff; i only have one record i've actually ever listened to before that i don't have a copy of (csny 4-way street; glad i never bothered to pay for it now). since i have been listening to tea leaf green almost exclusively for like two weeks (have i mentioned they're really good? yeah? good.), i think i might switch things up and spend tonight listening to this stack, probably 15-20 albums in there. i'm not doing a whole lot else... carling and free records it is. come along for the ride; i'm sure you want to read what i think about a bunch of old albums someone was willing to part with for no compensation. features include a very questionable-looking roger mcguinn solo record and an inherently suspicious ray manzarek album. can you tell i'm bored?
starting out with a david bromberg record called wanted dead or alive. i had heard of the dude, but i don't remember what i had even heard. this is one of those record that has like four people from the dead playing on a bunch of it. i grabbed like three bromberg albums in the bunch, so hopefully it turns out alright. if not, shit, i didn't pay for it. so far, it is alright. music is good, but the dude has a weird voice. hard to describe. first song was kind of bouncy an upbeat, but this next one is straight up blues and the voice is a lot better when he isn't so much trying to sing. the blues requires more in the way of highly emotive speaking than singing in my opinion. either way, the cover combined with the words to the first few tracks reveals a distinct humor element. i can appreciate it when it is done like this - where the music is no joke but some words are kinda silly. this is why zappa and primus kick ass but tenacious d can kiss my ass. i am supportive of music having an element of comedy, but not so much the other way around. just not my thing, with the possible exception of dennis leary's "i'm an asshole". anyway, i just managed to look up bromberg's wikipedia, and it turns out he's from philly. far out. currently living in delaware, something we can all aspire to. decent guitar playing in my book (jerry plays on most of the record, but he is so easy to pick out i know who is playing what), style is seriously eclectic. translation: this is a record i enjoy listening to, but will not often be the right record at the right time. nothing better than when that works out. but overall i like it, and i'm glad it isn't terrible, cause i have like three of the dude's albums now. lots of instruments on most tracks, really well arranged. one of the records is live and i'm curious how many people play on that. right now the arrangements on these blues tracks remind me of goodnight ladies on transformer. nice minimalist reading of statesboro blues on here with a bunch of other shit worked in. crazy version of kansas city, very big band yet still bluesy. this is a record i will put on again sometime.
time for this ray manzarek business. i heard a different solo album of his while my friend was giving me all of these records, and it was totally over the top. operatic vocals, very proto-electronica at the time. this one so far sounds like he just wanted to keep playing the music the doors did, but he gets to be jim. oh, and not be in a band with jim. the opener is like some sort of a rock and roll samba. some cool percussion. i guess i can kind of dig it. i thought this one would be equally ridiculous given the album art and the fact that it is called 'the golden scarab'. and yes, all visible skin on mr. manzarek is painted gold on the cover. as things progress, it is definitely extremely doors-esque but doesn't sound like anything they would have actually played. or maybe it just seems like that because jim was so distinctive in writing and voice combined with a little synthesizer technology development. i think the song that is playing now actually was a really old doors song that never made it to record for them.
as mentioned, these record reviews are brought to you by carling black label beer. confusing thing about this beer: carling is like the budweiser of britain, so that is the immediate association. in two places on this can, it says "carling canada" and has a big maple leaf. however, lower on the can, it says product of the u.s.a.. strange, but cheap. i like that. it should be up there in use with strange, but true. gotta find a way to work it in a little more.
the manzarek record has quickly degenerated into mediocre cheese. if the music and songwriting were better, okay, if things got way cheesier, okay, but this is just lukewarm and uninteresting. enough of that shit. i'm not going to throw the record out, but i'm not gonna put it on again real soon i do not think.
time to check out this keith and donna record. too much donna from the get go, i wish she would just take it easy. she's touring with the zen tricksters these days. if they played close, i might go. the bass is really good, i wonder who is playing. john kahn; i should have guessed. looks like he only plays on this track though, that is too bad. shit, this reminds me some guy gave me a jerry band disc today. i should play that later too. we'll get there. i have a feeling that this whole record is gonna be a little too much donna. keith sure as shit shouldn't sing. his piano is hardly even audible thus far, which is too bad because he could still play pretty damn well in 75 when this came out. things are getting a little better on the album, sounds like apocryphal janice joplin with way better keyboard work. the baby on the sleeve is named zion. seriously, who the hell names their kid zion? who does that?
time for another carling black label ad. this beer is brewed by g. heileman brewery, who you may know from such hits as old style. they are one of the milwaukee breweries that got by alright and managed to swallow up other regional brand naming rights.
hah! i was about to give keith a bunch of credit and suggest that he should have played more organ instead of piano all the damn time. turns out it was merl saunders on the organ for that track. i guess he should have played more organ in the dead too, only problem is he wasn't ever in the band. for all the praise heads heap on the 70s, i think the band would have been way better, and admittedly way different, if merl was in the hot seat for a spell. that isn't a job you can really recommend to anyone though. i hope bruce hornsby and tom constanten say a prayer of thanks and supplication every day of their lives. the curse is so strong that it killed off the keys dude from dark star orchestra.
surprisingly, the album itself is pretty much exactly what i expected. nothing blows me away, but it is all pretty decent music. i was hoping for a little more cheese on this record, a la keith's "let me sing your blues away" off wake of the flood. working in a little sax now, but nothing as outrageous as that track. most of the songs are things the dead could conceivably have played with the godchauxs in the band, but ones i'm glad they never did. just filler. nothing bad, but nothing good either.
gonna give this roger mcguinn thing a go. looks like he mostly plays other peoples' music on this one, but the guitar and vocals are absolutely unmistakable. something to be said for that. the man does what he does. makes me interested in hearing the one byrds album i picked up, the notorious byrds brothers. we'll see about that sometime.
man, all these records i was skeptical about but willing to give a shot make me look forward to the flea market in the park across the street. next weekend, i believe, is the first one of the year. can't wait. wish i had a little more money to throw around, but i'm sure i'll make a good pickup or two.
man, mcguinn can do dylan like few can. i've heard a ton of people do knockin on heaven's door, but this is somehow just so right. i feel like zimmy would put some kind of stamp of approval on this. bitchin pedal steel, and someone is playing perfect rhythm section piano. and god, that guitar. any time you have someone with an immediately distinctive tone, you are probably dealing with a worthwhile guitarist.
the following announcement has been paid for by carling black label beer: my cats are super fuckin pretty and little.
whoa, the music just took a turn for the soulful. works out alright. rocking, but a nonstop gentle country caress from mcguinn's guitar, all the while approaching a genre not immediately congruous with what normally goes on for the man. the result is very late beatles; something that could have made it onto let it be (it isn't like that record couldn't use a little help here and there). now things are just straight folksy byrds style. i didn't need more of this, if i wanted the byrds i would probably put on one of the umpteen (not marked) byrds albums i already have. some silly string arrangement on this, and it is just unnecessary and overdone. someone probably told mcguinn that, and whoever it was probably got fired. the album cover has roger leaning on a wall of recording equipment, looking very pleased with himself/coked out, and the lettering is that definite 70s conception of the future style. at least the guy can play and sing, even if his writing is hit or miss. well, i guess he didn't write a bunch of this, so i have to critique is song selection, and whatever just played was a poor choice.
now he is actually showing a little maturation in his guitar playing. i love how the guy plays, but it is always kind of the same stuff more or less. this track features his neil young guitar (thankfully not vocal) impersonation, and it sounds great. stuff neil himself could be proud of. i was discussing neil young with a buddy today, and damn if the dude isn't one of the all-time greats. makes me want to throw some on, but i'm gonna play at least one more new record before that i think. might actually play the second record of four way street, they do a pretty psychedelic southern man, and i wonder what cowgirl in the sand sounds like; it is actually kind of short compared to the version i am most familiar with.
alright, one more new record i'm gonna talk about for tonight. gonna make it the brewer and shipley album with one toke over the line on it, see if they have anything else to offer as a pretty typical folk duo at the height of psychedlic scene exploitation. these dudes look ridiculous. but i do love one toke over the line, and it sounds fabulous on vinyl. the guy i got it from didn't know they did this song, but i did tell him. he seemed a little regretful, so i offered to give this one back, but he let me keep it. we'll see if it is worthwhile. one toke is the lead track with good reason. what is not to like? my old mp3 of the song is off the fear and loathing soundtrack, and the beginning is the monologue listing all of the drugs in the case, and wasn't a bad addition at all. the rest of the tracks proceed apace; the whole thing is like simon and garfunkel for people who were too cool for simon and garfunkel. or maybe people who had taken a vow to not listen to simon and garfunkel for like ten years. this album is as good as any other album i've bought for just one song i knew and loved.
but that's enough for now. if you didn't really read anything that's cool. i'm mostly just amusing myself as best i can. lots of things i should do, but nothing i want to do. this was a fine alternative. listened to some decent tunes, but probably nothing i'm going to push on anybody. i'll probably wind up playing more tlg before i go to bed. just can't shake that addiction. they're playing here again, during my exam period. i think i will probably go anyway.

blinded

but not by the light. or anything poetic at all. no, i broke my glasses. on sunday. i am rapidly losing patience with not being able to see a damn thing. it is not easy to work on a computer or read fine print all day like this. i did, however, get what i considered a good deal at this place. it was more engaging than i thought a place for optical needs could really be. they were all helpful and the selection was outrageous. a lot of things i thought i wanted (octagonal frames anyone?) that made me look even stranger than i actually am. in any case, i look forward (oops. inadvertent pun.) to getting new glasses.
fortunately, i am at a point where i don't use them for reading textbooks half the time anyway. managed to handle a good bit of property law this evening. i always thought i was interested in the history of the law and how it had developed, but after reading thirty dense pages about transfer of property over time under feudalism., i have been forced to reconsider. the best part was, after you learned something, it turned out that law no longer applied anywhere except like maine and new hampshire. over and over. actually, it usually applied nowhere anymore. my main takeaway lesson here is some ridiculous terminology to throw around. fee simple absolute is a big one. i wonder if absolut vodka has ever incorporated that in one of their many witty advertisements. doubtful. they prefer to really stretch the concept. i would also like to know how long this has been their campaign, but i can't expect all you grey goose drinkin' types to keep track.
i have more or less made it through the winter with almost no liquor, mostly because i don't prefer it and because it is such a hassle to get. and also a waste of money. liquor never seems to last as long as it theoretically should. whatever, it is not something i missed too much. and now the weather is turning nice and i do love seasonal beer in the spring and summer. drank a beer on a porch today, perfect weather for it. even opened a window when i got home, and the cats are really excited about that. i'm excited about that because fresh air over forty eight or so degrees has been a long time coming. but i am still more excited about the prospect of restored vision.