Just to show I don’t only listen to 80s pop-rock, here’s something with a little more class. Mannheim Steamroller is a good compromise between classical and the kind of clarity I like in music. A friend of mine in Iowa who used to build car stereos used this song to test the bass. He said this could blow out cheap speakers like nothing else. It gets a little boring toward the end, so make sure to have the volume up for the beginning when the drums kick in.
[Before I get to the post, a little blog housekeeping: I just changed my settings so that once you've had a comment approved, all your future comments will be approved automatically. That way regulars won't have to wait two days for me to get around to checking them, especially on weekends. Now back to the show.]
Gardening actually began a few weeks ago, but this is my first report on it this year. We’re trying something new this year, called Square Foot Gardening, where you physically divide your garden up into one-foot-square sections and plant them each individually. I’d tinkered with the idea before, but I tried to do it halfway, dividing the spots by measuring them instead of building a physical grid. That doesn’t work very well, because a square foot seems like a bigger area than it really is when you’re planting tiny seeds, and when things grow, they’re way too crowded. So this time we’re doing it by the book, building the actual grid and planting what it says a square foot can support. Read more »
If I told you that, once upon a time, Eric Clapton and the Bee Gees teamed up, called themselves The Bunburys, and did a song to promote the Olympics, you’d probably ask for some of whatever I’m drinking. But it really happened, and here’s the proof. I’m not ashamed (well, not too ashamed) to say this blasted out of my 1973 Buick Century on several occasions in 1988 while I was delivering pizzas around the town of Ames, Iowa. (Sorry, no video available.)
People who know me personally know I’m very much a do-it-yourselfer. I do my own plumbing, electrical work, computer repair, and so on. I even took a stab at self-dentistry once when I was desperate. But there’s one service I’ll gladly splurge to have someone else do, and that’s mowing the lawn. Read more »
I was pretty hard on Jim back on Monday, so I wanted to add that I don’t really blame him; he’s just doing the best with the situation he’s found himself in and responding to the incentives he’s been offered. He doesn’t know what would happen if we went back to a constitutional system, where responsibility starts at the local level and the federal government does as little as possible instead of everything we deem important. Maybe he personally would take it in the shorts. It’s hard to blame him for wanting to keep the system that’s making him comfortable. Read more »
(Yay, two posts in two days!) I thought I’d follow yesterday’s interminable screed with something lighter: I’ve mentioned before that my favorite car is the 1987 Buick GNX, so when a rare picture of one comes across my screen, it catches my attention. This one is made of awesome.
Jim is a regular American guy. He works for a living, has a family and a home, and doesn’t think about government too much. Mostly he leaves it alone and hopes it’ll leave him alone. He prides himself on being moderate enough to vote for both parties, but he mostly votes for incumbents—his life is pretty good, so why rock the boat? So now that we’ve gotten to know Jim a little, let’s spend a day with him, shall we? Read more »
What About Me, by Moving Pictures, an Australian band, is one of those songs I’d catch once in a while on the radio as a kid, but not often enough to get tired of it. I especially liked the saxophone part, since I was playing that at the time. But it took forever to track down who did it, looking it up in those big books they used to have in the music store, and of course stores didn’t often stock one-hit-wonders that were already a few years old. Thank goodness for the Internet and music downloads. Unlike most 80s videos, there’s nothing weird or disturbing about this one, if you don’t count the soft focus and the singer’s earnestness. Enjoy.
