Personal

The stuff about me and my life. The “diary” side of blogging.

Skim! Skim like mad!

by

Ouch.

One major benefit of using a newsreader — you can keep track of many more websites far more easily than when you have to individually visit each site.

Of course, the downside kicks in when you ignore your newsreader for four days, as I’ve just done.

Nine hundred and thirteen posts to work through before I’m caught up (and, since there’s no way I’ll make it through all that by the time I crash out tonight, there will just be more added to the pile tomorrow morning).

Whee!

Look for the linklog to get a lot of use over the next few days.

iTunes: “Resistance Song” by Sobule, Jill from the album Sobule, Jill (1994, 2:59).

Blogger Anon-O-Con

by

Many thanks to Pops (The Two Hour Lunch) for setting up this Saturday’s Blogger Anon-O-Con down at the waterfront. Got to hang out and chat with Pops, Richard (Tikun Olam), Mike (Dumb Blogs Have More Fun), Anita (Anita’s LOL), Ted (Ted Leung on the Air) and Julie Leung (Seedlings and Sprouts), Chip (The Binary Circumstance), Receptionista (Hammer and Peg), Staci (Daymented), and Myk (Life, it is a travesty), along with Pops’ counterpart Mom, their own Mr. Man, the Leung’s children, and Prairie. All in all, not a bad gathering in the least!

Apparently my Utilikilt was something of a hit, seeing as Mom is now suggesting that Pops should get one of his own — and what do you know, Pops found out that UK is having a Father’s Day Sale.

Utilikilts’ First Annual Father’s Day Extravaganza is open to all Utilikiltarian Fathers, Dads and Papas! Any father who make a purchase of a new Utilikilt between Mon June 14 — Fri June 18th during regular business hours 9:A-6:P PST may deduct your age from the price of any Utilikilt of your choice (limitations and restrictions apply).

Sounds like a good deal to me, though being childless (and in no hurry to change that status), I’ll have to sit this particular sale out…

iTunes: “Mr. Pitiful” by Commitments, The from the album Commitments, The (1991, 2:11).

I’m a music whore

by

I used to have all of my music stored on my old computer as .mp3 files. When I got the new computer, rather than just copying everything over, I began the process of re-ripping my entire CD collection as AAC, as they sounded a little better and are slightly smaller than the old .mp3s. As I have a lot of music, this project takes quite a while, and I’ll approach it in fits and starts — ripping a ton of CDs over a few weeks, then getting tired of it and taking a break for a few weeks, then getting back into it.

I’ve been back in the “rip like mad” stage for the past week or so.

Progress so far:

Out of the (roughly) 1200 CDs that I own…

I’ve imported probably somewhere around 850 (my album count reads at 879, but that includes any tracks I’ve purchased from the iTunes Music Store).

There are 2,927 separate artists listed (though this is increased a bit by things like “Artist X presents Artist Y”, or “Artist A featuring Artist B”, and so on, not to mention soundtrack cast albums where nearly every song has a different ‘artist’ depending on which characters are performing).

My collection takes up 44.13GB of space.

It would take me 33 days, 13 hours, 21 minutes, and 57 seconds to listen to the entire collection from beginning to end.

The entire collection consists of 10,282 individual tracks.

And I’ve still got a few hundred more albums to import. I’m quite curious as to what the final count ends up being.

Now, if only I could afford either a wide enough pipe to start a ‘net radio station, or a low power FM transmitter to run a small local radio station (of course, I have no clue who’d actually tune in, but I still like the idea). I’d just put the entire collection on random, and let it go.

iTunes: “False Documents” by Anderson, Laurie from the album United States Live (1984, 1:59).

Spring Cleaning

by

With a lot of very appreciated help from Prairie, my apartment is now cleaner than it has been in…oh, probably in about a year, since the last time I went on a mad spring cleaning rampage.

It’s kind of freaky, actually. :)

Who knows how long I’ll be able to keep it this way, but at least for the moment, I could actually invite someone over for the first time without being embarrassed when I open the door.

iTunes: “Piggy Bank” by K.M.F.D.M. from the album Naïve: Hell To Go (1994, 6:36).

Dress Code

by

On bright, warm, sunny days such as we’re having here at the moment, I’ll usually start the day off wearing my kilt. Work clothes go in my bag, and I make the walk from home to bus stop, the bus ride, and the walk from the bus stop to work as comfortable as possible. Once at work, I duck into the restroom and change.

Yesterday I needed to grab something to drink about an hour after I started my shift, so I ducked over to the Starbucks Coffee next door. The barrista gave me a quick look up and down, then asked, “Hey! Where’s the Utilikilt?”

I laughed. “Not appropriate for work, unfortunately.”

“What? Why not?”

While our company dress code does specify that either slacks or skirts can be worn — and I’m of the opinion that a kilt should be acceptable — regional and district heads can specify their own rules for their area, and our area apparently specified slacks only. Not only does this keep me from wearing the kilt, but one of the ladies I work with is a little miffed that she can’t wear a skirt. I’m not sure why this is the case, but so it is.

Still — it’s rather nice to know that the entire female staff of the Starbucks next door to my job (since the rest of them soon chimed in on this discussion) are of the opinion that I should be allowed to wear my kilt at work.

Now we just need to convince the Powers That Be.

iTunes: “Killing Moon, The” by Echo and the Bunnymen from the album Rock and Wave Vol. 1 (1983, 5:44).

Almost famous

by

A couple of months ago, I was interviewed by a prominent news/entertainment magazine for an article they were preparing on webloggers who had lost their jobs or faced some other form of catastrophe due to their weblogging. The interview took place over the phone over a period of about two days, and once it was concluded, I was told to expect a call from photographers for the magazine, so that they could get a picture of me at my computer here at home to run alongside my section of the article.

Unfortunately, I didn’t hear anything back in the next few days…which eventually stretched on to weeks. Eventually, I assumed that for one reason or another, the story had been scrapped. I recently got this e-mail confirming my suspicion:

Sorry it’s taken so long to get back to you. The blogging story has been put on ice, unfortunately, mainly because we couldn’t find enough people who got in trouble with their blogs. Sorry, will let you know if anything changes.

A pity, really. I was looking forward to seeing my face in a national newsmagazine, even if it was more press centered around my making something of a stupid mistake.

I’ve sent the interviewer a link to the list of dangerous bloggers in the hope that there might be one or two names on it that didn’t get tapped in the first round, but at this point, I’m not holding my breath. Looks like I’ll just continue my slide back into obscurity. :)

Folklife reports

by

I only made it out to one day of this year’s Folklife festival, but Chas (who just stopped by work to say hello earlier this week, so I’ve now added another local writer to my list of people I’ve met) made it through all four days. He’s got a good writeup of his time there, contrasting it to a similar event in DC and pointing out quite a few links to local bands worth investigating.

Maybe next year I’ll be able to hit more of it. In the meantime, I’m really looking forward to this year’s Bumbershoot (using the almighty power of Google, here’s a few links to my ramblings of past Bumbershoots, to give you an idea).

I can’t really think of something similar in Anchorage. Maybe the Talkeetna Bluegrass Festival? Hmmm…now there’s something worth babbling about at some point. File that away in my “writing subjects” list…

iTunes: “Push th’ Little Daisies” by Ween from the album Pure Guava (1992, 2:49).

Plans

by

Today would be a good day for an earthquake. Or at least, it would fit into my schedule nicely.

— Your Local Goddess

iTunes: “Discotheque (DM Deep Extended Club)” by U2 from the album Discotheque (1997, 10:06).

Fun on the bus

by

I didn’t take much notice of her when she sat down next to me on the bus. It was a busy morning, there were only so many open seats available, so a sudden seatmate wasn’t really that much of a surprise.

I was a bit taken aback when she poked my arm to get my attention, though. I put my iPod on pause and popped out the headphones to see what she’s said. Unfortuantely, I couldn’t make heads or tails of what she was saying. I did rather quickly manage to pick up one very pertinent piece of information, though.

This girl was stoned out of her mind. Absolutely blitzed. And whatever she was on, I’m pretty sure it was a lot stronger than anything I ever tried in my more adventuresome days.

For the rest of the trip, she sat next to me, talking to herself (and occasionally to me, though very rarely did I actually catch any intelligible words), inflection bouncing up and down the scale as she asked and then answered her own questions, and occasionally bursting into a sudden fit of giggles.

At one point, after examining the cigarette she was holding in one hand, she dug into her pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. Opening the pack, she slid the one she’d been waving around into the pack, and pulled out a fresh one. Replacing the pack, she then opened a side pocket on her purse, and pulled out a small brown glass bottle. She unscrewed the cap, extracted a small applicator stick, and proceeded to smear some rather foul-smelling substance along the length of the cigarette she’d just taken out. Once the cigarette was quite covered and soaked in whatever was in the bottle, she capped it, put it back in her purse, and resumed her private little monologue.

I haven’t really got a clue what was in the bottle, but I’m guessing that I’ve just had my first close encounter with “smokin’ stix“. Hopefully my last, too — that stuff smelled foul.

iTunes: “Your Very Own Tank” by Rollins, Henry from the album Talk is Cheap, Vol. 1 (2002, 17:42).

Vacation time!

by

In something of a minor miracle, I’m actually managing to plan something three months in advance — rather amazing, considering I’m usually lucky if I plan something three hours in advance.

I received notice a few weeks ago that my friends Marc and Laura are going to be getting married this year, on Saturday, the 11th of September (apparently, when making reservations Laura was asked why they chose that particular date, and it was all she could do not to blurt out, “Because we’re a couple of SICK TWISTED FUCKS!!” — I do love my friends…). Seeing as how I’d actually like to be there for this event, if for no other reason to see whether the earth cracks open and swallows them both whole for daring to upset the order of nature in such a way, it seemed like it would be a good time to look into planning a vacation.

Plus, there are a couple of other important dates in that general area — specifically, my friend Erika’s birthday is the 12th, and my dad‘s birthday is the 15th.

So, I’ve requested and been approved for a week off of work (paid, even, hooray for vacation time!). I don’t have actual airline tickets yet, since this is rent week, but that will come as soon as possible (gotta take advantage of the cheap airfares, after all). The current (rough, but probably close to accurate) plan is as follows:

Friday, Sept. 10th: swap shifts at work to work 10am-6pm or so. Get off work, head straight to the airport, and catch a 9-ish flight up to Anchorage. Get picked up (I hope) by either family or friends, crash out somewhere for the night.

Saturday, Sept. 11th: see my friends get hitched. Harass Marc for ordering a kilt to wear at his wedding, but then chickening out and not wearing it properly (at least, that’s what Laura has told me the current plan is…).

Sunday, Sept. 12th: celebrate Erika’s birthday. Take her out somewhere, get her nicely toasty, try to take advantage of her, and get shot down in flames (all in fun, though).

Monday, Sept. 13th / Tuesday, Sept. 14th: bum around, see friends and family.

Wednesday, Sept. 15th: celebrate dad’s birthday. No drunken debauchery this time, though. That’s just icky.

Thursday, Sept. 16th – Saturday, Sept. 18th: bum around, see friends and family.

Sunday, Sept. 19th: fly back home and return to the day-to-day drudgery of normal, non-vacation life.

I am so looking forward to this. I haven’t had a real vacation in years — generally, my other visits have been rather hasty, fit-it-in-over-a-weekend deals with a lot of running around, but very little actual relaxing involved. This should be far, far better.

iTunes: “Let It All Come Out” by Giblin, John/Simple Minds from the album Street Fighting Years (1989, 4:56).