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Concert Report: The Extra Glenns, Rilo Kiley, Xiu Xiu, 20 Minute Loop (Noisepop!)

Continuing the trend, this was my first show at Cafe du Nord. We wound up getting there a little early, but with Roger's amazing parking technique we got a spot about 20 feet from the club, which is unbelievable. A good start! We waited around, and my other friend showed up, and we waited a little more before they finally opened the doors. You go down some stairs into the club, giving it that basement feel, although a nice basement. They seemed to have a much better beer selection than Bimbo's, although I wasn't drinking anything. Oh well. We got to see a lot of the artists walking around while we waited for the room with the stage to open up. When they opened that up, everyone rushed in and grabbed the seats. Oh well! Standing for us.

The first band was 20 Minute Loop, who turned out to be really, really good, especially for an opening act. They had two singers, a man and a woman, and they were both individually very good and they sounded great together. Roger was impressed enough to buy their CD, and I would probably have done that if he hadn't. They had a really full sound, a little poppy, but I think the vocals were what really made it sound good. We were pretty happy at this point, since it was turning out to be a much better show than the last time we saw the Mountain Goats.

Next up was Xiu Xiu (pronounced like it was pinyin, I think!), who we had seen hauling suitcase after suitcase of stuff into the club as we were waiting. They played all sorts of instruments, including this gigantic guitar of some kind, a little guitar, a cool squeeze-box thing, and some various bits of metal hanging on some kind of frame. This was all interesting to watch, but I didn't really get into the music much. The guy that sang didn't have a voice that grabbed me, and the music was a little more "noise" than I'm good with on first listen. We began to get nervous things would go downhill again, although I started to wonder if some of the pain of last time was the extra 2 hours we had to wait before the show.

Then it was Rilo Kiley's turn. And they were really great! The lead singer was really good, the band sounded really good, and the crowd was in to it. Unfortunately, the tall guy in the front row was about as tall as the lead singer plus the stage height, but us short people handled it ok. Their guitarist was really good, too, getting in to it and rocking out to get the crowd going, while never veering into extreme guitar solo territory. They just had a really good sound, and convinced Roger to borrow money to buy another CD. Heh!

And then it was finally time for The Extra Glenns, everyone's favorite John Darnielle (from the Mountain Goats) and Franklin Bruno supergroup. They played mostly things from their CD that just came out, which was all nice, although really I think I get into their solo stuff more, so I was disappointed they didn't do more of that. They did a song Franklin had written last night, which was really cool, especially since John couldn't read all the lyrics. They had some funny interaction back and forth (Franklin's "I'll talk to you for free" probably being the best line) and John told a couple of stories. It wasn't as impressive to me as the last tMG show I saw, probably because there was less storytelling between songs, and maybe because my expectations were a little higher. The show was still really good - I probably haven't laughed that much at a show since Calvin Johnson - and the whole night was pretty good, but I think that first Mountain Goats show remains my favorite concert.

After the show, John sat on the stage selling his latest CD, which, from the first few songs I listened to, is really awesome. It was finally my turn to buy a bunch of CDs from the Absolutely Kosher guy. I was able to replace the Mountain Goats CDs I had given away or no longer had access to, get the earlier Franklin Bruno solo CD, and get my first Nothing Painted Blue CD - I let the AK guy pick which one, and he seemed to think it was a no-brainer, so we'll see how that turns out.

And then a drive back, full of conversation about distance, threats, idealizations, religion, and travel. Was that sufficiently vague?

Overall, the whole show was quite good, with 3 out of 4 very enjoyable sets. If only the shows could keep getting better the rest of the weekend! Not sure how that would be possible, though.

This afternoon

...would be a fantastic time to go play outside.

Concert Report: Death Cab for Cutie, Dismemberment Plan, The Velvet Teen, Aveo (Noisepop!)

This was my first show at Bimbo's, which turns out to be a pretty swanky place. We parked at a nearby hotel, since street parking seemed pretty difficult, and wound up having to wait int he "passes, badges, and vouchers" line. It seems like people who bought the badges should not have to suffer so much, but oh well. I'll try to make the best of it. But the place is very nice inside, including lots of tables to sit at that still let you see the stage over all the standing people. The sound is not quite as good at the tables in the back, but we didn't know that initially, and got a nice table on the end. We also wound up with a funny waitress (Alison?) who even joked about the hot dog being made out of "lips and assholes". Hehe! Of course, she later shortchanged me $1, so maybe she wasn't that nice...

Anyways, first up was Aveo, a 3-piece that played some pretty straightforward not-too-hard rock. They only got to play a few songs, though, so they didn't really get much of a chance to make an impression.

Next up was The Velvet Teen, another 3-piece, which had a little more dynamic sound and was pretty enjoyable. Their sound didn't quite distinguish them enough to get me too excited, but they were certainly listenable.

Then it was time for Dismemberment Plan. And they were cool! Finally, some crowd interaction, although the people they got up on stage were all escorted off right away, which seemed weird. But they throw in lots of samples and 80s video game sounds to keep things sounding interesting. I really like the lead singer's voice except when he is doing one of the more rap-style songs, which didn't quite work for me. But they had a neat sound, anchored by some solid drumming, with the other three band members trading around guitars and synthesizers and stuff. At one point, there was even a forehead hitting the keyboard, bringing back fond Sesame Street memories. Oh yeah. Convinced me to buy one of their albums.

Finally it was another 4-piece, Death Cab for Cutie. They wound up having the same problem their album had for me; it was listenable, but undistinguished. It didn't really hold my interest. I can't completely write them off, since I was getting tired and had had a few beers by that point, but they didn't grab my attention, especially after the unique sounds of Dismemberment Plan. Some of their songs were all right, but... it just doesn't come together for me. So we left when they said they only had a couple of songs left, since some of us need to get up for work tomorrow.

Overall, a very pleasant start to Noise Pop. All the bands were decent, one turned out to be pretty cool, and we had a fun time. Hopefully things get even better from here!

Random Links

I must be getting busier at work, I didn't have time to check these out but they sounded cool:

The Alphabet Synthesis Machine - use genetic algorithms and a sample character you draw to create an entire allphabet. Download as a font! Yeah!

Big Ball of Mud - the most popular programming design strategy. A paper presented at a PLoP conference.

OK, off to dinner before the shows. Hopefully, the concert reports will start late tonight! First up: Death Cab For Cutie, Dismemberment Plan, The Velvet Teen, and Aveo, and my first trip to Bimbo's 365.

Thank you!

How can you not have a great day when you receive this in the mail:

Semiotics for Beginners

xblog can't be too bad of a blog if it has a language category. In addition to that last link, they also had a pointer to Semiotics for Beginners. I point to it here in hopes I will go read it someday. Maybe I'll finally be able to understand the later Nevèrÿon books by Samuel R. Delany, who first introduced me to the word semiotics.

Language and Thought

One of my most interesting classes in college was a linguistics class. We discussed the Safir-Wharf hypothesis, which questioned if languages influenced thought. Most of the research seemed to say no, but it still seemed like an interesting question. New research is starting to look at more possible ways language could have an influence on thinking. The specific examples discussed in the article seem a little weak to me - how do they decide what adjectives are "masculine" and "feminine"? Or are the subjects picking from predetermined choices, which would make more sense? But my experience with Japanese so far does give me some intuitive ideas for other things to look at - counters for different types of objects, lack of gender titles, family descriptors that include more details, the use of verbs for giving and receiving. Of course, I still don't have an answer to my question about relative reading rates in different languages - do some languages allow faster reading speeds? I know speaking rates are supposed to differ, but I really wonder about writing with phonetic alphabets (like hiragana and katakana), semi-phonetic alphabets (like english), and non-phonetic writing (like chinese characters or kanji). Maybe that is what I should go back to school for.

Soccer: Win (4-3)

Imagine that, two in a row. Amazing. Unfortunately, I sat out almost all of the second half because of a foot/ankle injury just after the half started. Blah. I had played OK before that, although we were down 3-1. One was a breakaway that we hadn't quite played the offsides right for, another was on a corner where I got my head on it playing post but it still went in. I tell you, if I were a foot taller I'd be better on those plays. Thuy played goalie in the second half and was awesome - I don't think he let anything through. Roger was the only other work person there, and he did a good job on defense and in the midfield.

Robots.txt

It would be nice if a site like the Web Robots Database existed that was up to date. Who are all these bots hitting my site so often? google and daypop are clear enough, but some of the other ones seem suspicious. Oh well. At least the robots seem to like the site!

Noise Pop: The Plan

Well, I finally got the Noise Pop all-show passes in the mail yesterday, so now I just need to figure out what to go see. Reading other people's descriptions of the bands just makes me more confused. Tuesday is easy - only one show, and I want to hear both bands. Wednesday is also easy, since The Extra Glenns are playing. Friday, Modest Mouse makes the decision easier (and I am excited to hear The Aislers Set, otherwise I would have to think harder about going to see MM again). But Thursday and Saturday? Not to mention, choices of during the day shows on Saturday and Sunday? I guess it is a nice problem to have, since other people aren't even able to go. So we'll see how it goes, I guess, and I'll try not to waste my badge. Lack of scenester coolness doubts setting in...

Silly humans

"What sublime folly is the human organism! Drool at the thought of it! Our mathematical perfection is so tedious!"

- Lothar the robot, in The Metabarons: Blood and Steel

Comic Review: From Hell (Miller and Campbell)

This was so much better than the movie, it is amazing. I particularly enjoyed the footnotes, which detailed the research that each scene was based on, and began discussing the themes that Moore wanted to address with the work. This added a depth to the work, reinforcing the fact that it is based on a true story, and including a lot more background material to give the story a better sense of context. The story of the murders is used to explore ideas of how the media shapes truth, darker human emotions, and the belief in magic. It doesn't seem to play as much to the class issues the movie brought up, and includes none of the emphasis on drug use that was so prevalent in the movie. Which makes me wonder - how did that become a focus of the movie? The relationship between Inspector Abberline and Marie is played with a much lighter touch, which seems much more plausible. The grisly murders are also much more affecting than they were in the movie, which says something about the success of Eddie Campbell's art. The largest problem I had were some of the speeches that the characters gave, especially Gull talking about magic and time and things like that. I know that this became the basis for a lot of Moore's later explorations into creativity and reality, but it seems a little heavy handed and out of place here - showing more of the author's voice than the character's. But reading a few chapters of this before bed every night this past week definitely gave me a lot of interesting, uncomfortable dreams. It is definitely worth checking out, and make sure to read the footnotes. I found reading them all at the end of the chapter to be a good balance that kept the scenes being referred to fresh in my mind but not interrupting the story flow too much.

Movie Review: Twin Falls Idaho (Polish)

It's your classic story of conjoined twins and a prostitute falling for each other. The movie captured my attention when I flipped on IFC one day, and kept me there until the end, which was kind of surprising. I think the movie did a fine job of making the characters sympathetic without being overly melodramatic. It also did a fine job of making sure some of the smaller details set up early on were paid off by the end of the story. I think its most admirable accomplishment is not using the gimmicky plot point (conjoined twins) in ways that seemed too manipulative. It kept a quiet tone, letting the story play out on its own, without trying to force you to feel a certain way too many times. Of course, the scene with people taking pictures through the cage-like bars of a fence was over the top. Not a great movie, but certainly enjoyable.

Google Is Still Awesome

Google's language tools include fantastic versions like Elmer Fudd, Pig Latin, and Bork, Bork, Bork.

Watch

Let's continue with the exploration of just how cheap this digital camera is and just how terrible of a photographer I am. This is my neat new watch:

But I liked these pics more:

Dave's Online Cooking Show - Cheddar and Chive Spoonbread

Back in my school days, some friends and I would get together and eat a big meal the weekend before thanksgiving. Everyone would cook some of their favorite dishes from their family's traditional thanksgiving menu, Ben would cook as many free turkeys as our collective Giant Eagle cards gave us, and we'd eat until we couldn't move. It was always a good time. One of my favorite dishes, though, was some corn spoon bread someone made one year. It was like cornbread, which is already pretty tasty, but more extravagent. I've never found quite the same recipe, but every once in a while I think about it.

A few weeks ago when a very nice person I know that I had told this story to memorized (!) a spoon bread recipe for me! I was of course very excited to try it. It was a Cheddar and Chive Spoon Bread, which sounded quite tasty, although not the same as the dish I remembered. But you can't go wrong with cheese!

So here goes:

Step One: Get someone to memorize the recipe for you, and scrawl it down on something you can take to the kitchen.

Step Two: Preheat the oven to 350F. You'll have to do the conversion to C yourself, my vast international readership.

Step Three: Grease an appropriate sized dish to cook the spoonbread in. I don't have a real 1.5 quart souffle dish, so I am using a loaf pan. Maybe it will seem more bread like this way!

Step Four: Gather your ingredients. Try not to think about how much dairy you will be consuming when eating this. Also note, I got real Wisconsin Cheddar for this. If you are going to put the effort in to this, at least do the cheese right! Also note I got way too much cornmeal; don't be intimidated by the size of that bag.

Step Five: Combine milk, water, butter, salt, and pepper in a pan and heat it up. You may not want to put it on completely high heat unless you are stirring a lot, since that milk will burn on the bottom of the pan quickly. (Not speaking from my own experience, of course!) But you should bring it to a boil.

Step Six: Take the cornmeal (which you should probably measure with real dry measuring cups, but I seem to have been dispossessed of mine, so this is good enough)...

...and add it in, bring it back to a boil, then turn the heat down. Be careful with this! I think this is where I messed up. Add it in slowly, because it will clump together easily. Make sure to stir it a lot, so it is more evenly spread throughout.

Step Seven: Let it cook until it thickens - about 3 minutes. Remove it from the heat and stir in the sour cream. You'll note it seems a little lumpy in my pictures - oops!

Step Eight: Take 4 eggs...

... and beat them.

Step Nine: Add 1/4 of the cornmeal mix to the eggs and mix together. Then fold in the rest of the cornmeal mix. I don't think I did this part well, so you are on your own really for how that should work.

Step Ten: Take the cheese and chives...

...and mix it all together.

Step Eleven: Pour into your baking dish.

Step Twelve: Bake 35 minutes. You can do a toothpick test, or just watch until the center looks firm and the edges are a bit brown. I probably cooked mine a little longer than necessary.

Step Thirteen: Eat! Whoohoo. If you are feeling particularly responsible, you may wish to let it cool a bit first.

Step Twelve: Wish you had someone around to do the dishes for you!

The ingredients:

• 2 cups milk
• 1/2 cup water
• 2 Tablespoons butter
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 1 cup yellow cornmeal
• 2/3 cup sour cream
• 1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar (get the good stuff!)
• 1/3 cup chives
• 4 eggs

Nutritional Information:

I have no idea, but this can't be very healthy for you. So make sure to share it with friends, and not eat it all yourself! It probably feeds a whole bunch of people, especially as a side dish. I'll have leftovers all week from this!

Special Thanks:

• People who memorize recipes for me. Sorry you couldn't taste any!
• Dan Sanderson for the Dinner and a Weblog inspiration
• Whole Foods for being a good grocery store to shop at, even if they always trick me into buying extra cheese.

An evening of pool

Tonight's going out to dinner to bitch about the world turned into more bitching about work than bitching about relationships, which wasn't quite as fun for me since I couldn't participate as much. Oh well. It was still fun.

Afterwards, we went and played pool. I am not much of a pool player. I can usually hit the ball I am aiming for, but it rarely does what I want it to do after that point. So it is fun enough if I am with people of similar skill level, and tonight was mostly like that. But I think I have found the best pool place in the area:

Lucky Shot Billiards

189 S Murphy Ave

Sunnyvale, CA

(408) 739-7665

You go down into this basement area, and it turns out they have really nice, well-maintained tables. The people who work there are friendly, the atmosphere is nice, the music isn't too loud, and the drinks are reasonably priced. Everytime I go there I have a good time. So that is my pool hall recommendation if you are in the area.

Brains for Choco-Zombies

This may be the best chocolate gift ever, or at least the best-shaped chocolate gift. I still feel weird ordering things like this for myself, and I would order them for a certain other person, but I think I need to wait an appropriate amount of time since the last gift. Otherwise it would be creepy. Although maybe I could justify this one for myself, since I could then attempt to eat only brain-shaped foods for some amount of time. Oooooh...

Tomorrow's Goal

Is to leave the apartment.

Movie Review: Clockwatchers

The story of four temps working in an office. I know part of the point of this was to show how mind-numbing that kind of work can be, but the movie was a little dull to me. The intrigue of the office supply thievery seemed a little forced; it might have been better to get to know the characters a little more, or follow some of the other characters in their life outside the office. Not much to say about this, I guess - it makes me glad to not work in a very business-y office, if nothing else.

Bad Morning

nothing like waking up too early, still being sick, and realizing you just ran out of tissues but still have an unending supply of snot...

Hot Fudgy Valentine's

Still feeling sick (and having monitor issues), so things may be sparse around here for a while.

But today was valentine's day, so I feel obligated to acknowledge it. Had friends over for hot fudge sundaes with the frozen custard, which isn't exactly romantic, but you could say it is sweet. It's a bad holiday, really, but it is pretty hard to avoid, so you might as well try to enjoy it somehow. I think I would have done a better job doing something silly for my friends if I hadn't been sick. Oh well.

Here's some history about how we got this holiday. This was the sweetest thing I saw today, though.

Uh oh

I think I am actually getting sick. Symptoms include stuffy nose, scratchy throat, sleepiness despite plentiful sleep, and just general feelings of being out of it. Ugh.

Hardware sucks

My monitor is acting all messed up - weird horizontal lines based, apparently, on the relative brightness of that row of pixels. How did this just start happening all of a sudden? I worked my way through most of the troubleshooting guide, which was all a waste, as expected. Blah. Great, another big organization I need to deal with.

Going backwards

Ever feel like you are going a different direction than everyone else? You are not alone, but you may be living in the wrong galaxy. It is cool to be reminded about how little we know and how we keep learning more anyways.

(And would I link to any story with a headline including the words "oddball" and "galaxy"? Probably.)

Movie Review: A Beautiful Mind (Howard)

I'm definitely not the world's biggest Russell Crowe fan, although I did really enjoy Romper Stomper, and The Insider was a nice 3 hour distraction during a parental visit, but I would see just about any movie that has a mathematician as the protagonist. Science people treated like rock stars, that is my goal for the world. And I knew this movie was not going to be about the math at all, so I wasn't disappointed by that. It focused on the story of John Nash's schizophrenia and how, through sheer willpower, he learned how to deal with it. A very amazing story, and it was well told, although there was definitely some excessively emotional sequences that you should expect from a Ron Howard movie. Despite that manipulation, I enjoyed it well enough, and there were some good performances in it. Jennifer Connelly did a great job making me not be annoyed with her decision to give up her life for her husband's.

And my fun John Nash fact is that he graduated from CMU for his undergrad degree. Yay, CMU alumni.

Convention Report: Alternative Press Expo 2002

My expectations for this convention were a lot different than they were last year. Really, though, I just hoped for a better parking spot than last year, and not as much walking through cold rain. I also was more familiar with a lot of the names of guests of the show, so I was excited about meeting them, or at least seeing them, since I usually have difficulty saying anything meaningful to people who I respect as artists of some sort.

A couple of people from work went with me, and we were supposed to meet some people at the show, which made the planning a little trickier, but we managed to get up there about on schedule, and snagged a nice parking space. It was also a fantastically beautiful day, so things were looking good.

We did an initial walk around the exhibit hall, and all the standard indie comic players were there, which was cool. The show seemed like it might be more crowded than it was last year. Maybe that was an artifact of always wondering where the other people I was with were, though. I also noticed a lot more names I recognized, which was cool. Still unsure of what to actually say to these people, but that's ok. My one lame moment came when I was looking at the stuff by Rick Geary (The Treasury of Victorian Murder), which I really liked. I wasn't sure if it was actually him sitting at the table, though, and he didn't say anything to me as I stood there and flipped through the book. I should have asked, because his stuff is awesome. Oh well.

The best interaction experience came with meeting James Kochalka. He seemed very nice, a little embarrassed or uncomfortable about selling his stuff, but I actually said a few things to him. He promised me his new CD would not disappoint me, so I got that and a few of his comics I didn't already have. He signed all of it, and included a little cat picture on one thing! So neat. (And, on initial listen of the CD, I wasn't disappointed... so he wins that round...)

One of the friends I was with is a big Optic Nerve fan, so she got a poster signed by Adrian Tomine, who also seemed pretty quiet. She kind of wanted to have him sign the back of the poster, which surprised him, so she said he could sign the front. Heh!

I didn't get to go to any of the panels because I needed to get back in time for dinner plans, and I don't think I bought quite as much stuff as I would have if I were alone. I did score a cheap copy of the From Hell trade at the Cold Cut booth, which was nice. I also picked up a little comic based on an online comic - I need to be careful about talking to artists, since I am easily suckered into giving someone $1 or $2 if they seem really enthusiastic about their work. But this did turn out to be amusing, so that was good. I also got an issue of Last Kiss, primarily because their website had been so funny. The guy that does that was quite friendly.

Things I should have bought but didn't because of time: Zot trades by Scott McCloud, and Finder trades by Carla Speed McNeil. Oh well - I should be able to pick them up at the store sometime.

I definitely feel like I have a better sense of what stuff I like and what is going on in the indie comic part of the world than I did a year ago. Hopefully I didn't give up too much to gain this knowledge! But it was a very enjoyable time, and the people I was with seemed to enjoy it, and it did seem like there was a lot of interesting stuff being put out. There is a part of me that wants to get into the real small publishing scene more, but part of me that thinks it isn't worth the filter time it would require to find the good stuff. I obviously need friends who are into it to help point out the cool stuff!

(edited this to put in a whole bunch of links that no one will click on!)

Soccer: Win (4-3)

Hey, we are undefeated! Whooo. I'll enjoy it while I can. The team actually looked pretty good - lots of the same people we had last time, with a few new faces. We played a pretty solid game, although the new goalie we have made me nervous - lots of bobbles, lots of bad goal kicks, including one resulting in a goal. But we managed to keep scoring, including an awesome header by Dave off a Thuy cross. Oh yeah! I was much more tired than I should have been, and played a mediocre game. A few good stops, lots of missed chances. Sometimes the defense just feels organized, and sometimes it doesn't, and today it definitely didn't.

Busy Day

Today was a busy day, and I am very tired now, so I don't feel up for a full update. But let's see if I can remember what I should try to talk about tomorrow:

• A Beautiful Mind
• APE
• Getting pulled over
• DDR

Hrm, that really does not seem like that much stuff listed out like that. You'll just have to take my word that that actually filled an entire day of activity. And hopefully tomorrow will be a little busy, too... although I am not sure where I was supposed to schedule the relaxing part of the weekend.

Ups and downs, its all about the ups and downs...

Etiquette

What do you do if you receive a gift of something you already have and you get asked "Do you already have it?"

Bass Bass Bass Bass Bass!

I bought a bass today! Whooo. It is red. It came with a big amp. I like it. Whooo!

Site Redesign

One of these days I will redesign this site to make it, if not any nicer to look at, at least easier for me to muck around with. And this means better use of stylesheets for layout. And it could be part of my scaled-down review website plans. I'm sure I'll have tons more freetime any day now.

And I bet everyone else loves these entries I post instead of just mailing myself the link. I'm trying to be nice and share, ok?

Spring

I think it is officially spring for me since the weather was nice enough to walk to work today. Yay.

You may ask if this wasn't true earlier, and you would be right, but poor meeting scheduling (and slow morning readiness skills on my part) meant I wasn't able to take advantage of it until today.

Of course, it doesn't quite look like spring outside yet, and we may still have some rainy season left, but I'm willing to try to make the mental switch early this year.

Inevitable Manipulation

This article should not be used to tempt myself into installing IM software at work. Really. I don't need more distractions. Especially not fun ones. Especially not fun ones that can use up hours of my life without my really noticing.

Alternative Press Expo

How had I forgotten that this year's APE is this weekend? It looks like all the cool comics kids will be there (Kochalka, Tomine, Lutes, Clowes, etc.) And to think I had already made plans for this weekend! Argh. Hopefully I can squeeze in a couple of hours earlier on Saturday. I had lots of fun last year, and it provides a great excuse to buy a bunch more stuff and see people whose work I like, even though I never know what to say to them.

400

I hadn't noticed, I went over the 400 post marker. Go me. Good thing they are occasionally more interesting than this one.

If I had a million dollars...

I would still not be able to make the Slate 60, a list of the largest philanthropc donations and donation pledges over the past year. Who tops the list? No, it isn't Bill Gates, despite the recent Newsweek cover. It is Gordon Moore (and his wife Betty!) who donated $5.8 billion dollars. Wow. That is a lot of money. Bill Gates (and his wife Melinda!) only donated $2 billion. I guess they need to save something for their kid's college fund. It is nice to see that some of the people who spend so much effort trying to make money eventually try to do something useful with it. Maybe there would be more encouragement if this list included estimated net worths as a comparison point. It also seems like a lot of money went to colleges and universities, which is definitely nice, but it might be good to start a tradition to give something to high schools and grade schools, since that could help even more people directly.

Kind of makes me feel like I should do more than my random assortment of non-profit memberships.

Word of the Day

Today's word of the day, as expected, is "sore".

Ouch.

Three sides of fudge

Thanks to my good friend greg, I received my birthday cake today. I know, you'd think the custard is enough, but really, there's something about the cake tradition. Usually, I get the Honey Fudge Cake, which is a classic in my family (my dad has a copy of the recipe in his safety deposit box, just in case) and is incredibly rich and tasty. This year, I didn't try digging out the recipe (if I even still have it), so I got a new kind of cake, which is possible just as extravagent. It is a thick chocolate cake with a layer of chocolate mousse in the center. Instead of frosting, though, it is covered in fudge! Wow, that is a lot of chocolate. But it is tasty! My goodness. It also goes really well with the vanilla custard, apparently, although I didn't have room to try that out. Maybe tomorrow!

But now I have way too many desserts in the apartment. Anyone want to come over to help finish them off?

Even Monkeys Fall Out Of Trees

To continue physical activity weekend, I went climbing at Planet Granite after soccer today. It was fun, although I was only able to do a few climbs before my arms started complaining too much. I'll blame wallyball, although it could be a combination of poor climbing technique and my weak arms. I did manage to do an "8+", which I guess is pretty decent for a very beginner. There is something to be said for climbing up walls, like you always wanted to do as a kid but would get into trouble for. I didn't have any problem with the heights, although I felt pretty confident in the people I was climbing with and their ability to not drop me. So I will probably go again, although I'll try not to be so injured and worn out next time.

Wallyball

It doesn't sound like a real thing, but in fact wallyball is a real sport. And I can even say I played it now. It is basically volleyball played on a racquetball court using what seems like a volleyball-sized racquetball. It is really fun, with lots of crazy off-the-wall shots zipping around, although the rubber ball is hell on the forearms if you play for two hours. I guess the sport is a relatively recent invention, but old enough to have had some political battles.

And who is the most famous wallyball player? George Bush, of course. Weird.

More weblog songs

Found another song about weblogs thanks to burningbird. You can get the mp3 here. I can't say it is a great song, but it is kinda funny. Cam also corrected me by pointing to this one, which is a parody song about weblogs (does that count?), and I'll do you the favor of not pointing to the mp3.

It isn't easy tracking these things down, let me tell you, so please let me know if you are aware of any other songs like this.

Candidate 2012

Here is something that may be interesting to do. The application makes me feel like I don't really know enough about politics, though. Political heroes? Who I would want to be my campaign manager? Ugh. But going around the country, learning about what people think about things would be really neat. Not sure work would like me to take an 8 month vacation. So I'm posting this to tempt me later.