This is not a tag line!
life in the us
NFL/ FFL Week 9
Nov 10th
What can I say? The Broncos won in a convincing way with a strong performance by Plummer. Congratulations to Rod Smith for becoming the recipient of all the notable receiving records in Broncos history!
On the FFL front, I lost again. I was leading before Monday’s night game with three players still to play (Culpepper, Wayne and Robinson) while my opponent had Manning and Clark (one of Indy’s TE). Manning had too strong a game while Culpepper was just good and that was it. 
Speaking of my opponent, I played Patrick Burleson this week. Not only did he beat me at FFL, but he also dissed me on his blog by forgetting me when he talked about the post-postgreSQL seminar dinner, despite overwhelming evidence of my being there! 
(for those who don’t know me, that’s me on the far left, Patrick being at the far right; picture taken by Erin Mulder, Brian McCallister, though present at the dinner, had already left by the time the picture was taken).
I also see that Robert posted a comment on Patrick’s entry about him only talking about important people… I wish I could say I will make him eat his words as we battle in week 10 in our fantasy league but I’m not quite sure my Cassoulet Farts are up to the challenge! 
Black and blue…
Sep 30th
Music for Robots has posted two articles (along with related tunes) about upcoming albums that I am eagerly waiting for.
The first one is about Frank Black‘s new album, Frank Black Francis. Frank Black a.k.a. Black Francis a.k.a. Charles Kitridge Thompson IV, is one of my favorite songwriters both as the (newly reunited)
Pixies’ front man, solo or with the Catholics. His songs and melodies are always somewhat off putting at first: each time I buy one of his albums, I am most often left not knowing what to think of it, yet it keeps growing on me with each successive listening. The melodies are simple yet surprisingly complex with twists that you don’t expect taking the song in a different direction out of nowhere.
The second article is about Elliott Smith‘s posthumous album, From a Basement on the Hill. Elliott Smith was way up there with Frank Black, though in a significantly different style, as far as songwriting went. The best music often comes from the artist’s darkest times. Elliott’s melodies and lyrics were poignant, comforting you when you feel blue, offering to take part of your burden. Unfortunately, there was no-one to comfort Elliott and he took his life last October. He is still sorely missed and will be for a long time…
Twilight from the album From A Basement On The Hill by Elliott Smith
Metric/Walkmen concert
Sep 29th
I realized that I forgot to post about the concert last week. The 9:30 Club doors opened at 7:30pm to a small “crowd”. The opening act was Kevin Steele and the Sports, a three-man band. The music was good but didn’t leave too much of an impression on me. What did was the fact that they were probably just starting to tour and local since it seemed like the parents of each member of the band were in the attendance (in fact right in front of me, which is how I spotted them)!
The big attraction for me was the second band, Metric. They didn’t disappoint though the sound balance could have been better. The singer is certainly most energetic but seemed prone to mood swings: she would sometimes seem down then very enthusiastic the next moment. Kinda weird. I especially appreciated the live renditions of Hustle Rose and Calculation Theme.
The main band was the Walkmen and it was rather disappointing because of the sound balance: way too loud, too much distortion, not enough volume on the singer’s mic. It’s rather difficult to enjoy music when you cannot distinguish what the singer is singing and hear the subtleties of the melodies because it’s drowned out in noise… Add that to the fact that I didn’t really know the band to start with and you can see why it was far from being a great gig for me. The members of the band didn’t even seem to enjoy themselves that much. Oh well…
So all in all a mitigated musical experience. Next in line: The Faint with TV on the Radio & Beep Beep on October 17th. Then comes The Libertines with Radio 4 the next Tuesday followed Death Cab For Cutie with Pretty Girls Make Graves on Saturday 23rd. Finally, Interpol with Secret Machines on November 9, though Muse has just been announced for November 8 and I have been wanting to see them live for a while now so I think I’ll just have to get tickets! All the shows are at the 9:30 Club, which, considering the bands who play there, is pretty dang good if you ask me. I just wish they would put more effort in the sound balance…
Melody from the album Misery Is a Butterfly by Blonde Redhead
Moment of Jimmy Swaggart Zen
Sep 23rd
Xeni Jardin:
During a recently broadcast sermon in which he discussed his opposition to gay marriage, evangelical telepreacher Jimmy Swaggart said:“I’ve never seen a man in my life I wanted to marry. And I’m going to be blunt and plain: If one ever looks at me like that, I’m going to kill him and tell God he died.”
Someone please tell me how such an attitude is considered Christian? Whatever happened to Thou shalt not kill
? Or even Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain
? WTF? I cannot even begin to imagine how someone who’s supposed to be a believer could say such a thing. I don’t consider myself religious but this guy manages to offend me. This guy gives religion a bad name and he’s supposed to be a preacher?!?
Blue Hour from the album Ether Song by Turin Brakes
I’m back…
Sep 6th
… and I’m TIRED! Several wakeboarding/water ski sorties a day (including one early this morning in the fog) combined with lack of sleep and with end-of-Labor-Day traffic (I was driving) result in a very exhausted self. Maybe more on this WE later in the form of pictures and maybe videos…
Four Ton Mantis from the album Supermodified by Amon Tobin
Labor Day
Sep 3rd
I’m going away for the Labor Day week-end (answering the wakeboard call) so I probably won’t post until Tuesday. Have a safe holiday (for those of you who live in the US). Despite going away, my thoughts will stay with everyone in Florida as they get ready for Frances‘ landing.
Anime feature in Wired
Aug 31st
Wired offers a nice article by Charles C. Mann on how animes came to be and why they might be on the verge of becoming mainstream in the US (though one could argue that they already are).
For all the interesting historical notes, there is a glaring omission in the article: while Oshii had an undeniable influence over the “look and feel” of the resulting animation, Masamune Shirow, the author of the original Ghost in the Shell manga and one of my favorite mangaka, is responsible for the themes and general story. Since the Wired article deals more about the themes (at least when addressing Innocence) than the animation itself, I think it would have been appropriate to credit the Shirow since the subjects that Mann highlights are really his.
On a related note: I am not despairing to see Appleseed in the theaters here yet, but I am not holding my breath either. Appleseed is another of Shirow’s mangas that has also been turned into an anime in 2004 (it’s actually the second time this manga was animated but the first effort was forgettable.
Innocence opens tomorrow (in the US, anyway)! Wired has a review.
Lazergum from the album The Sound Of (R)Evolution by Mouse On Mars
Evangelist
Jul 1st
When I first started at my job, all the computers we used were PCs or Sun stations. After a while, I lobbied to get a Powerbook to be able to telecommute and was able to get one. Not long after, we needed to do some video editing and I managed to convince my management (with help from one of our collaborators) that we needed to go with Final Cut Pro so an iMac 17″ was bought to run it. It soon became obvious though that it just wasn’t up to par to do the task efficiently: a maxed-out G5 was thus ordered… The G5 and its two 20″ Cinema Displays is now my everyday computer while the iMac is used my one of our new guest researchers.
Just yesterday, my group leader came to see me asking me how easy it was to install an Airport card in the iMac since he is seriously considering buying one for home. I think I can probably still convince more people to switch at my work… The hardest part was to get the first Mac. Once people see really what Apple is all about instead of relying on myths, they usually have to admit that Apple computers are indeed good computers that are worth considering in an enterprise environment, especially when I am able to do things faster and more easily than my colleagues with PCs!
iPepsi
Mar 15th
I finally found a Pepsi bottle that was part of the iTunes promotion and I won! I tried to use the documented trick to make sure I won but first, I couldn’t see anything (turned out that the plastic protection of the cap was bubbly, preventing a good reading) and second, I felt like a criminal doing it in the store so I tried to do it as inconspicuously as possible, thus lowering my chances of seeing anything even more…
I had quite a hard time finding those damn bottles. Turns out I wasn’t looking at the right place: I had been looking in the aisle where you can buy packs. It seems that the participating bottles are only sold by unit. I guess it makes sense but I didn’t think about that earlier. Then again, I didn’t try real hard either!
Those Kids by The Beatifics on Indie Pop rocks!
