A while ago some other MCB grad students sent me an invite for a service called Friendster. Basically, it's a six degrees of separation website. Since I was spectacularly bored that day, I signed on, noticed that some friends from high school were also part of it, and then never thought of it again. Today, one of those friends from high school sent me an email suggesting that I go look at Friendster again. And so I did.
Apparently the new fad on Friendster is to create profiles for famous people. I found Jon Bon Jovi, Christopher Walken, and Rod Farva. Then I found fictitious people, like Reed Richards, Buckwheat, and Dark Helmet.
But I really lost control of my Laugh Muscle when I found the Friendster pages for inanimate objects. Apparently The Death Star likes shopping at Fashion Bug. "In bed" stuff irritates Fortune Cookie. Trendy Shoes wants to meet like-minded socks. And, my personal favorite, Germany's favorite TV show is Hogan's Heroes.
Ahhhh....the wonderful things geeks do when bored.
Saturday night was mu-ziq night at Bottom of the Hill. Dianna told me I'd like that club, and boy howdy, did I ever! It's a tiny little space out in the middle of a BFE semi-industrial area. No crowds of sleek 30-something hipsters to wade through. No parking problems. Just bizarre isolation.
The show itself was pretty good. The first band (whose name I forget) sounded like a combination of Mogwai and Godspeed You Black Emperor, but there was nothing new. The second band, Him, sounded a lot like Tortoise, but slightly more jammy. In case you haven't figured it out, the first part of the show was entertaining, but nothing new.
Mike Paradinas (mu-ziq) hit the stage with a bang. I've always wished for a sound system loud enough to listen to drill-n-bass at those levels. But this show was an excellent temporary solution. The only problem was that my body decided to rebel against me two-thirds through the set. Suddenly, my stomach realized that I hadn't eaten a real meal in twelve hours. This happened at the same time my brain figured out that I was very very tired. About 10 minutes from the end I finally gave up the ghost and sat down in the back room. And instantly fell asleep sitting upright.
Anyway, if you've gotten tired of reading this post about a band you've never heard of, let me make an executive summary:
I now resolve to never read Bay Area independent newspapers like The Guardian or The East Bay Express. Every time I do, I discover some new great thing that I've either just missed or am just finding out about too late to actually do anything about it.
While riding the bus home tonight I opened up The East Bay Express and turned to the music section.
"Hmmm, I wonder what's going on in the music world?" I mused. "I see that Mogwai has a new album. I'll have to check that out. Hey, The Cinematic Orchestra has a new album, too! Why, I love those guys! I'll just read this mini-review of it.... 'New album'....'it's good stuff'....'recently visited San Francisco'......what?......NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME, GOD!?!?!"
Dianna and I found a new roommate this week. He's no Death Metal Bassist, but he's awesome in his own way. If you thought I was tall, wait until you meet the Giant Canadian Electrical Engineer. Dianna immediately pegged him as looking like Hugh Laurie, who played Wooster in "Jeeves and Wooster". Having never seen the show, I had to admit my ignorance. Netflix came to the rescue and delivered the entire first season right to my doorstep. We're two episodes in and I'm already having trouble refraining from the British accent.
Saw The Italian Job tonight. Fantastic caper movie. And I knew I saw Spider-Man in one of the scenes.
Most of my thoughts on visiting Tacoma and the University of Puget Sound can be found in Michele's post on the subject. To briefly summarize: "Weird, and I no longer fit there." The Pacific NW as a whole, on the other hand, is still a perfect fit. I think after grad school I'd like to return there, possibly to Portland or Seattle. But there's no need to plan that far ahead right now. Dianna is also keen on this plan, and she passed her NW entry test with flying colors by correctly pronouncing Skookumchuck, Puyallup, Snoqualmie, Willamette, and even (gasp!) Auburn. I'm a little embarassed about quizzing her on that last one. I tried to foist it off as a "trick question", but I don't think anyone bought that excuse.
In other news, I'm considering overhauling the layout of AC. I've made one partial mockup but wasn't very excited about it so didn't follow through. If I find something I really like in the next few weeks, I might go ahead and code the design.
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Courtesy of the coolest website ever
Last night I had a dream in which I thought I had found my long-lost dog. I played with him, but he seemed to be a different color than I had remembered and sometimes was rather stand-offish with me.
Later, after my dog had transformed into a car and I was driving him around, I realized that this was, in fact not my dog at all. Because my dog didn't have a CD player.
