Note to self:
When your boyfriend buys himself a brand new computer, try to remember that for the next few weeks, he will love it more than he loves you. As such, it is not advisable to kick the new computer (even if it was only by accident because the damn thing sticks out too much since there are already two other computers under his desk).
1) What’s Up - 4 Non Blondes
2) The Battle of Evermore - Led Zeppelin
3) Wild World - Cat Stevens
4) Luminous Times (Hold On To Love) - U2
5) Young Pilgrams - The Shins
6) Unbelievable - EMF
7) Nervous Night - The Hooters
8) Holidays in the Sun - Sex Pistols
9) The Fool - Neutral Milk Hotel
10) Which Way to Happy - The Magic Numbers
Bonus: Just a Friend - Biz Markie
At last, I have learned the secret behind the mystery of the internets:
Note: this is not a link to actual porn, but you still might want to use caution when opening it at work.
Dear Upstairs Neighbors,
I fully understand that people in apartment buildings make noise. People drop things; they move furniture; they wear loud shoes. Lord knows I’ve received a few complaints of my own (including a couple from you, I might add).
So I usually just try to ignore the annoying thumps and thuds you make on my ceiling. I simply roll my eyes when you let out a series of the whoops and hollers that could only result from playing video games.
I look up and laugh when it sounds like you are having another one of your sprinting contests; I occasionally wonder if you’ve installed a bowling alley in your living room; and sometimes I suspect you’ve adpoted a herd of elephants.
But for the love of god, what could possibly cause you to bang on your floor in a random pattern for TWO WHOLE HOURS last night?
I’m not mad. Really, I’m not. But the curiousity is KILLING me! Like when I can’t identify a familiar face or get the last clue of a crossword puzzle.
WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING UP THERE?!
Sincerely,
Your Friendly Downstairs Neighbor Kate
Dude! Last night I mentioned that songs by The Killers and The Cure have been showing up on Anderson Cooper 360. Well, tonight Countdown with Keith Olbermann just had a bit with the Cure song “Close to Me.”
Now Countdown often uses popular songs with a specific reference in mind—last night I think it was “Burning Down the House” after a story about a dog who nearly did just that—but this one was completely unrelated to the story.
I wonder if someone started selling The Cure’s song rights to news organizations… Still, it’s cool.
Previously:
-Come Closer and See
Well, now that I’ve sufficiently depressed everyone, it’s time to lighten up and have some fun.
That’s right, bitches! The (somewhat) monthly SALIME Survey hath returned! In honor of the relaunch, everything comes in twos (as in 2.0) this time.
The old rules still apply: answer truthfully or lie your ass off, whichever you prefer. It’s all in good fun. Leave your answers in the comments, or post them on your own site and tell us how to find it. Heeeeeere we go!
1) Name the last two songs you’ve heard (in any format).
2) Name the last two books you’ve read (or other printed, non-web material if you don’t read books).
3) Name two websites you think everyone should visit/read.
4) Name the last two movies you’ve seen in the theater.
5) Name the last two movies you’ve watched at home.
6) Name two things that always go together.
7) Name two things that never go together.
8) Name two people who should disappear from the face of the Earth.
9) Name two things you’d really like to do before the end of the year.
10) Name two things you’ve done in the past that you never, ever want to do again.
Today is the twentieth anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster.*
Twenty years. Wow.
Of course, the region hasn’t even begun to recover. In fact, if they don’t replace the crumbling “sarcophagus” that protects the remains of Reactor 4, things could get much worse. As I mulled that over, I was reminded of a website I first saw a of couple years ago.
It’s the personal photographic account of Elena Filatova, a Ukrainian woman who documented her travels through the Chernobyl region on her motorcycle. It received international attention after it was Slashdotted in 2004.
Now I should mention that there’s some question about the validity of her story; many people now view her site as a hoax, saying that she was merely a tourist on a guided group tour, rather than a rogue photographer roaming the barren countryside on her motorcycle.
Whether or not that is true, I think her site is still worth visiting, not only for the photos, but also for Elena’s unique insights into the worst manmade disaster our world has ever seen:
Our Pyramids
The sarcophagus will remain radioactive for at least 100.000 years. The age for the pyramids of Egypt is 5,000 to 6,000 years. Each cultural epoch left something to humanity, something immortal, like Judaic epoch left us Bible, Greek culture- philosophy, Romans contributed law and we are leaving Sarcophagus, the construction that going to outlive all other signs of our epoch and may last longer then pyramids. [link]New Beginning.
Children had to part with their favourite toys. People had to leave everything, from photos of their grandparents to cars. Incredibly, people had homes, motorcycles, garages, cars, country houses, they had money, friends and relatives. People had their lives. Each had their own niche. And then in a matter of hours , their entire world fell to pieces. After a few hours trip in an army vehicle, they stood under a shower, washing away radiation. Then they stepped in a new life, naked with no home, no friends, no money, no past and with a very doubtful future. [link]
Here are the links to her two photo essays about the Chernobyl disaster: Ghost Town and Land of the Wolves.
Further Reading:
-Elena Filatova [Wikipedia]
-Chernobyl Disaster [Wikipedia]
-Chernobyl…18 Years Later [Slashdot]
-Latest Chernobyl Motorcycle Photos [Slashdot]
-Chernobyl: 20 years ago this month. [Boing Boing]
-‘Voices of Chernobyl’: Survivors’ Stories [NPR]
-New Sight in Chernobyl’s Dead Zone: Tourists [NYT]
-Chernobyl - Tschernobyl - Information
-Chernobyl Children’s Project International
*Incidentally, it’s also my parents’ 31st wedding anniversary. Which wouldn’t be quite so weird if Three Mile Island hadn’t happened on my dad’s birthday seven years earlier. I guess this is where I could make a joke about my nuclear family…
For the past few nights, I’ve noticed that Anderson Cooper 360 has been using music by The Killers and The Cure in their fades to/from commercials. Specifically, the songs I picked out were “Jenny Was a Friend of Mine” and “A Forest.” How cool is that?
Well, happy belated birthday (it was yesterday).
Image credit: NASA (full res image here)
See Also:
-Happy Sweet Sixteen, Hubble! [NASA]
-Hubble Space Telescope [Wikipedia]
I suppose it’s sort of late to mention this, but if you happen to be in Philadelphia tonight (or tomorrow night), be sure to check out the light show. Yes, I said “light show.”
If you’re in Center City at nighttime from Saturday through Tuesday, look up. As part of the CoreNet Global Real Estate Summit being hosted in Philadelphia next week, a light and laser installation called “Light Up Philadelphia” will be set up from more than a half-dozen downtown buildings and the Ben Franklin Bridge. [Inky]
See Also:
-“Light Up, Philadelphia” [6abc]
As I mentioned last week, I recently upgraded to a new cell phone model. Nothing fancy, just mostly wanted to get one with Bluetooth. Anyway, I’ve been having trouble deciding what ringtones to put on it. In addition to the regular ring, I like to assign special ringtones to my most frequent callers.
So tell me, what’s on your phone? Do you have specialized “ringer IDs” for certain people?
Note to Self:
The next time you stumble out of bed feeling hung over, looking for coffee and ibuprofen, and wondering why no matter how many times you rub your eyes, everything still seems blurry? It’s because you slept with your contacts in, you dumbass.
1) In Between Days (acoustic) - The Cure
2) Wordless Chorus - My Morning Jacket
3) Eleanor Put Your Boot Back On - Franz Ferdinand
4) There’s a Kind of Hush (All Over the World) - Herman’s Hermits
5) A Girl Like You - Edwyn Collins
6) How Bizarre - OMC
7) What I Am - Edie Brickell & The New Bohemians
8) Spirit In The Sky - Norman Greenbaum
9) You Got Lucky - Tom Petty
10) Dance With Me - The Drifters
Bonus: Enjoy the Silence - Depeche Mode
Just a little refresher on the Rules of the Random Ten:*
Hit “shuffle” or “random” on your favorite digital music player, be it on your PC, your iPod or some other device, and report on the first ten songs that it spits out. No skipping the embarrassing stuff. Post your list here in the comments, or tell us where we can find them.
*Rules are made to be broken. If you want to skip a over few songs because your “random” list has five in a row by the same band, that’s cool. The lists are more interesting if they have more than two artists. Or if you want to do something completely different, just say so.
Tomorrow is Earth Day (in the US). Go hug a tree.
Further Reading:
-Ecological Footprint Quiz
-Google Earth
-Earth on Wikipedia
-PlanetEarth.org
-International Earth Day
I have several college students who work in my office. Yesterday, I overheard them whispering about the meaning of “4/20,” like it was some big secret. So as I walked out into the other room, I quietly said “Everybody knows that.”
They all giggled, of course. Then I mentioned how I’d once been dragged to a George Clinton concert on 4/20, and ended up almost suffocating.
“George Clinton?” one of them asked, “Who’s that?”
“George Clinton. You know, Parliament? Funkadelic. The P.Funk All-Stars. One of the grandfathers of funk.”
Getting only blank stares, I just mumbled “Oh, nevermind.”
Then the discussion somehow turned to music that’s appropriate for kids. Someone brought up Dave Matthews Band (though I can’t imagine why…), and how there are always a lot of kids at those concerts. She said it surprised her, since DMB songs have a lot of language that isn’t appropriate for kids.
“Oh good lord,” I thought, and then asked aloud “Would you rather have your kids listening to Britney Spears?”
“Good point,” she replied.
Then I told them that I grew up listening to my parents’ music; lots of folk and Motown, some Simon & Garfunkel, CSNY, Billy Joel, Elton John, etc. [This isn’t to say that my parents weren’t strict about the language in any new songs to which I might have been listening. They just sort of forgot it was also present in some of their music. I used that argument to my benefit once I got a little older.]
But I digress. So anyway, as an afterthought I said “Oh, and the Monkees! I loved the Monkees!”
Blank stares again. “What’s the Monkees?”
It’s about damn time I updated the radio blog. So now, for your listening pleasure, I give you Wolf Parade. It’s good stuff, trust me.
I got a new cell phone over the weekend, so to prepare my old phone for retirement, we downloaded the old pictures and things I wanted to keep. And I came across the picture below, which I took on April 1st of this year at Suburban Station.
I realize it’s a rather crappy photo, but I just need to point out the thing you see hanging from the light there. It’s a loud speaker, strung up and wired in the most ghetto fashion you can possibly imagine. Now I realize they are working on this station (it’s only been what, 87 years?), but I found myself thinking “If anything could sum up SEPTA in a nutshell, this is it.”
Yeah, so April is more than half over, and I just realized that I forgot the open thread. Again. Damnit!
Oh well, here you go:
To whom it may concern: It is springtime. It is late afternoon.
-Kurt Vonnegut
Okay, I got nothin’ right now. I’m too busy to compose a proper post, but I really needed to write something so that my bare legs were no longer the first thing you see on this page!
So anyway, what’s the first thing you do around this time of year that makes you feel like spring has really started? For me, it’s giving myself a pedicure and wearing a skirt and sandals for the first time (hence the picture below).
I just spent the past few hours immersed in the old emails from my college days. I had the same computer for the duration, and staying true to my packrat nature, I kept nearly every email from all four years. I guess that makes me an e-packrat.
This little trip down memory lane started because I was looking for something in particular. But after it was found, I kept reading; laughing at the funny things I’d forgotten, and ruing the bad ones. In many ways, those emails are like the journal I never kept.
And while I’m so glad I have them, I can’t help but feel a sadness as I browse through the literary snapshots of my first years as a so-called adult; as I remember a lot of the wonderful people with whom I’ve lost touch, and the others from whom I’ve simply grown apart. I found my 19-year-old self pouring out my soul to people who I now haven’t heard from in years. How do we let these things happen?
I suppose that’s life; people change; time marches on. [Insert additional clichés here.] But it’s a little depressing to realize how much of it is my fault. I’m terrible at answering email or picking up the phone. I have the best intentions, the worst follow-through, and an amazing capacity for storing the guilt that results.
I am a little heartened by the way people seem to be reconnecting through the internet these days. Blogs and websites like MySpace (as much as I despise it) are bringing people back together—at least in cyberspace, anyway. So maybe there is hope after all. We shall see.
I have to admit, I’m a bit excited about NASA’s upcoming Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) mission. In addition to high-resolution mapping, the mission will send a small craft to crash into the moon’s south pole in an attempt to determine the presence of water. Water on the moon means that humans could soon follow.
Most of the things NASA has been doing lately have been really interesting, but there’s just something so special about our moon. A lot of people take the it for granted. It’s our closest neighbor; Earth’s faithful companion; we’ve even been there.
But the last astronaut set foot on the moon more than 30 years ago, and there’s so much more to do. Establishing ourselves on the moon will allow us to develop the technology we need to travel to Mars, and beyond. But the moon is not just the gateway to the galaxy; it’s also a place where we can look back at ourselves from a very unique perspective.
So when that little spacecraft (hopefully) crashes into the moon in a couple years, I will be watching—you’ll be able to see it with a telescope—and waiting with great anticipation.
Further Reading:
-NASA Adds Moon Crashing Probes to LRO Mission [Space.com]
-NASA to Crash Space Probe Into Moon [WaPost]
-Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter [NASA]
