1. "D-D-D-Dance," Micatone (from Belle et Fou [Original Soundtrack])
2. "Nude," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
3. "Theme from "Belle et Fou" – Bows," Jazzanova (from Belle et Fou [Original Soundtrack])
4. "Baby, It's Cold Outside," Louis Armstrong & Velma Middleton (from Basin Street Blues)
5. "Elliptical," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
6. "You Sent Me Flying/Cherry," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)*
7. "Baby, It's Cold Outside," Barry Manilow & KT Oslin (from Ultimate Christmas 2)
8. "When It's Sleepy Time Down South," Louis Armstrong (from Louis Armstrong: All Time Greatest Hits)
* Songs fused on European version
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Happy 25th Birthday, Commodore 64!
The Commodore 64 is 25? Really? Yikes.
Bourgeois dork that I am, I was a hard-core C64 user--so much so, that I was the president of a Commodore-64 User Group that met at the Rugby Branch of the Brooklyn Public Library.
Mmm-hmm!
The C64 was a step up from Commodore's initial foray into computing, the VIC-20. Should the previous sentence still seem obscure, the VIC-20 loaded games/programs from a tape drive.
That's right--a tape drive.
Explaining the excruciation of the aforementioned "technology" is no easy task. Loading a game took nearly half an hour. And saving something (God forbid) would take at least as long--if it worked. Yep--I could make a tray of frozen french fries, get through my math and English homework, only to find that my saving attempt had been in vain.
So when the Commodore-64 was released with its cutting-edge disk drive peripheral, a whole new world of computing was born--at least for me. Games were a key element in that new world. I had gone from being BASIC-savvy (I knew how to change the color of the screen and text color) to being a...rocket scientist.
Besides its innovative disk drive, the C64's biggest deal was its video games. Spy Hunter was my first, but it was certainly not my last. Through a friend of a friend, I stumbled into the video-game underground--a world where users swapped bootlegged video games (before Napster was a kilobyte on its creator's hard drive) like baseball cards. Every week, my cousins and I gathered around my computer to see what goodies my game-swapping antics had endowed us with. We played so much and so relentlessly, I went through three or five disk drives (ah, the golden age of store warranties!). A few of my all-time faves were:
- Summer Games
- Winter Games
- Racing Destruction Set
- Golden Axe
- Spy Hunter
- Impossible Mission
- Decathlon
- Spy vs. Spy
Ah, yes--good times! Happy 25th Birthday, Commodore-64!
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Top 8 Songs: Week Ending December 22, 2007
1. "Elliptical," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
2. "All I Need," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
3. "This Is the Place (Overture)," Micatone (from Belle et Fou [Original Soundtrack])
4. "Article 3," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
5. "Last Time," Bettye LaVette (from The Scene of the Crime)
6. "D-D-D-Dance," Micatone (from Belle et Fou [Original Soundtrack])
7. "You Sent Me Flying/Cherry," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)**
8. "Ding Dong! Merrily On High," Chanticleer (from Let It Snow)
* Not original album; sound sample
** Songs fused on European version
2. "All I Need," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
3. "This Is the Place (Overture)," Micatone (from Belle et Fou [Original Soundtrack])
4. "Article 3," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
5. "Last Time," Bettye LaVette (from The Scene of the Crime)
6. "D-D-D-Dance," Micatone (from Belle et Fou [Original Soundtrack])
7. "You Sent Me Flying/Cherry," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)**
8. "Ding Dong! Merrily On High," Chanticleer (from Let It Snow)
* Not original album; sound sample
** Songs fused on European version
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Top 8 Songs: Week Ending December 15, 2007
1. "The Sloganeer - Paradise," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
2. "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
3. "Michelle Johnson," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
4. "Heaven," Nas (from God's Son)
5. "Thank You for the Music," Abba (from Gold*)
6. "Perfect Gentleman," Wyclef Jean (from The Ecleftic -2 Sides II a Book)
7. "Jigsaw Falling Into Place," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
8. "Last Time," Bettye LaVette (from The Scene of the Crime)
* Not original album; sound sample
2. "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
3. "Michelle Johnson," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
4. "Heaven," Nas (from God's Son)
5. "Thank You for the Music," Abba (from Gold*)
6. "Perfect Gentleman," Wyclef Jean (from The Ecleftic -2 Sides II a Book)
7. "Jigsaw Falling Into Place," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
8. "Last Time," Bettye LaVette (from The Scene of the Crime)
* Not original album; sound sample
Friday, December 14, 2007
Only as Good as Your Word, Indeed: Susan Shapiro
In the interest of lifting my spirits, I decided to take a writing class last month. The five-week MediaBistro course was called "Writing for NYC Newspapers and Magazines" and was taught by scribe, teacher, and editor extraordinaire, Susan Shapiro, writer of the following book:
The course description for her class warns prospective students of her "brutally honest critiques." So I registered for the class ready to square off with the female version of Simon Cowell. Instead, I experienced critiques that were plain honest, supportive, and downright inspiring (must be the Brooklynite in me). Had it not been for her, I might very well still be in writer's-block hell.
I now understand why she has gained such a devoted following and why her courses fill up so quickly. She's the new crack for aspiring and established NYC writers and I, for one, am glad to be hooked.
Now if I can only get her to fix me up.
Sue's other books:
I now understand why she has gained such a devoted following and why her courses fill up so quickly. She's the new crack for aspiring and established NYC writers and I, for one, am glad to be hooked.
Now if I can only get her to fix me up.
Sue's other books:
Sunday, December 9, 2007
Top 8 Songs: Week Ending October 8, 2007
1. "Weird Fishes/Arpeggi," Radiohead (from In Rainbows)
2. "The Sloganeer - Paradise," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
3. "Scar That Never Heals," Jeremy Fisher (from Goodbye Blue Monday)
4. "Civil Twilight," The Weakerthans (from Reunion Tour)
5. "Yegelle Tezeta," Mulatu Astatke (from Broken Flowers (Soundtrack from the Motion Picture)*
6. "Avril 14th," Aphex Twin (from Drukgs)
7. "Thank You for the Music," Abba (from Gold*)
8. "Heaven," Nas (from God's Son)
* Not original album; sound sample
2. "The Sloganeer - Paradise," Meshell Ndegeocello (from The World Has Made Me the Man of My Dreams)
3. "Scar That Never Heals," Jeremy Fisher (from Goodbye Blue Monday)
4. "Civil Twilight," The Weakerthans (from Reunion Tour)
5. "Yegelle Tezeta," Mulatu Astatke (from Broken Flowers (Soundtrack from the Motion Picture)*
6. "Avril 14th," Aphex Twin (from Drukgs)
7. "Thank You for the Music," Abba (from Gold*)
8. "Heaven," Nas (from God's Son)
* Not original album; sound sample
Friday, December 7, 2007
The Wages of Perfectionism
Read an eye-popping article in the New York Times about the wages of perfectionism. The reason it was so eye-popping: I recognized my own reflection.
Hard as it might be to tell from the spotty output (or layout, for that matter) that is this blog, I'm a bit of a perfectionist. I want things to be the very best they can be--and often move heaven, earth, and good sense to ensure that my endeavors typify that ambition. I see complacency as my sworn enemy and the phrase "good enough" as a cop out of the lowest order. Consequently, the battles I fight leave me anxious, enraged, and disappointed. I end up resenting people who do their best to do the bare minimum. The resentment is tied to envy, of course--which makes me what you young people would call a “hater.”
I've often commented on the lyrics to "Swinging on a Star," the Jimmy Van Heusen tune made famous by Bing Crosby. I see them as the silent anthem of early-20th century America. On one hand, the line, "You can be better than you are" reads as a call to self-actualization. On the other, it posits that who you are is not good enough.
And while I could swing into a dirge on the wild swinging of the postmodern pendulum (the rise of dysfunctional chic), I could also get back to my point: the downside of being a perfectionist--which is to be perpetually unfulfilled. If you do manage to make a thing "perfect," the joy is short-lived, because there's always some task threatening to wreck a self-defeating reputation.
You would think that, given a year of health-care highs and lows, I would have reached the promised land--that Utopia where the small stuff gets/makes no sweat. And yet...I'm still grappling and likely always will.
My friend Christopher hooked me up with a really interesting take on Buddhism. And it has been a great help and source of solace. I just need to keep it going instead of letting myself get sucked into the flotsam that is perfectionism.
Namaste, indeed.
Hard as it might be to tell from the spotty output (or layout, for that matter) that is this blog, I'm a bit of a perfectionist. I want things to be the very best they can be--and often move heaven, earth, and good sense to ensure that my endeavors typify that ambition. I see complacency as my sworn enemy and the phrase "good enough" as a cop out of the lowest order. Consequently, the battles I fight leave me anxious, enraged, and disappointed. I end up resenting people who do their best to do the bare minimum. The resentment is tied to envy, of course--which makes me what you young people would call a “hater.”
I've often commented on the lyrics to "Swinging on a Star," the Jimmy Van Heusen tune made famous by Bing Crosby. I see them as the silent anthem of early-20th century America. On one hand, the line, "You can be better than you are" reads as a call to self-actualization. On the other, it posits that who you are is not good enough.
And while I could swing into a dirge on the wild swinging of the postmodern pendulum (the rise of dysfunctional chic), I could also get back to my point: the downside of being a perfectionist--which is to be perpetually unfulfilled. If you do manage to make a thing "perfect," the joy is short-lived, because there's always some task threatening to wreck a self-defeating reputation.
You would think that, given a year of health-care highs and lows, I would have reached the promised land--that Utopia where the small stuff gets/makes no sweat. And yet...I'm still grappling and likely always will.
My friend Christopher hooked me up with a really interesting take on Buddhism. And it has been a great help and source of solace. I just need to keep it going instead of letting myself get sucked into the flotsam that is perfectionism.
Namaste, indeed.
Monday, December 3, 2007
Welcome Back, Hudson and Gaines!
Hudson and Gaines, my absolute favorite podcast ever, has--at long last--returned to the virtual airwaves with episode 21! And this bourgeois dork couldn't be happier; I've been jonesing for nearly three months!
According to the comedic duo, the radio silence was the result of a tragic windstorm that blew over the WBFK tower. But you'll have to listen to the episode yourself to get the rest of the story.
This week's classic line: "...If you have any sort of a problem, Great Haven can be the place where we will gather you up in our arms, and we will be the figurative mother you don't have anymore, because your disability is too disturbing to your real mother..." (As spoken by the "G" in H&G, Mr. Craig Gaines.)
Welcome back, guys. You've been missed--big time!
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Top 8 Songs: Week Ending December 1, 2007
1. "Native New Yorker," (from Odyssey*)
2. "Brother," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)
3. "Sunny Skies," James Taylor (from Sweet Baby James)
4. "You Sent Me Flying/Cherry," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)**
5. "Ladies' Man," Chaka Khan (from Funk This)
6. "Fire and Rain," James Taylor (from Sweet Baby James)
7. "Hold On," Holy Ghost! (Digital Single)***
8. "Scar That Never Heals," Jeremy Fisher (from Goodbye Blue Monday)
* Not original album; sound sample
** Songs fused on European Edition
*** Not available on Amazon.com
2. "Brother," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)
3. "Sunny Skies," James Taylor (from Sweet Baby James)
4. "You Sent Me Flying/Cherry," Amy Winehouse (from Frank)**
5. "Ladies' Man," Chaka Khan (from Funk This)
6. "Fire and Rain," James Taylor (from Sweet Baby James)
7. "Hold On," Holy Ghost! (Digital Single)***
8. "Scar That Never Heals," Jeremy Fisher (from Goodbye Blue Monday)
* Not original album; sound sample
** Songs fused on European Edition
*** Not available on Amazon.com
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