too shy

"too shy shy
hush hush, eye to eye"

classic.

i love how the wikipedia page has a paragraph called "success and decline." which is perfect that they are combined into one, small paragraph, because the success and subsequent decline took place over three days.

it's true. look it up.

innocent man

awesome new term: bankslaughter. just like manslaughter, but it involves killing a bank due to reckless behavior and gross incompetence. nice.

here is an article with jeff tweedy in the new york times.

glass houses

where we last stood, ron paul was trying to audit the fed. well we've hit a roadblock. it's called the senate. it's not dead yet, which is a good sign and it's also gained some steam, which is also a good sign. but none of that matters if that twerp barney frank takes it and eats it during a senate finance hearing. he'll cover it with jam and eat it. i know he will. anyway, write your representatives and senators and tell them AUDIT THE FED!!!

i think it's amazing we're already talking about a 2nd stimulus bill when so little of the first one has been spent. seriously, what is the justification for a 2nd bill? the 1st one is not even out the door yet. most of it hasn't even been spent. apparently it's hard to spend billions of dollars. i'm not sure how that is so hard either. you buy lots of cds, fourteen houses, six cars and the moon and you've got yourself a billion dollars spent. watch out for this. if this starts gaining momentum, look out.

speaking of the 1st stimulus bill, where is that money? here is the answer.

here are the 500 biggest companies in the world.

rolling stone has an excellent, ranting article on goldman sachs. really good work.

speaking of speculative bubbles, remember john meriwether? the guy who got booted from salomon brothers and then almost brought down the market singlehandedly with long-term capital management? well his latest hedgefund just bit the dust. surprise, surprise.

i can't stand it

i said i was done and i am done. i'm not writing another word about the new wilco album. but.... here are several reviews that you can read to make up your mind. and trust me, you'll need a shower after reading the rolling stone review. i had the same feeling after they reviewed the new U2 album.

pitchfork

the onion avclub

paste

popmatters

rolling stone

houston chronicle

stranger

i have decided not to review the new wilco album. what is the point? i've made my feelings known. there's really nothing else to say. it's the worst album of their career. it's flat, unimaginative and musically and lyrically uninspired. that's all. i'm done.

robert mcnamara died. if you haven't seen the fog of war, you should. speaking of, here is a clip.

steve "air" mcnair died this weekend too. his death was a little more complicated. the details are still being unearthed. mcnair, eddie george and chris johnson were supposed to be the next trio of stars for the houston oilers. but instead the team moved to tennessee and became stars there. except chris johnson, i don't know what happened to him.

interesting article about the american marriage. i have extreme hope for marriage. it's not easy, but it's worth it. every little heartache is worth it. i like the joke between a son and his dad. the son says, "it's amazing dad. 50 years and you never once had an affair. how did you do it?" the father replies, "i can't drive." nice.

no more sarah palin? what a shame. here's five reasons why she quit.

big shot

we're back to the groovy titles of sir william joel for this end of the week blog. it's the end of the week because i don't have to work tomorrow. or saturday. or sunday. i don't have to work again until monday. and i think it's appropriate to use the works of sir william joel for this end of the week blog.

i actually have my review written for the new wilco album. i have it written in my head. i'm not sure i'm ready to share it yet. i don't know that i have totally devoured the album yet. but i can say how disappointed i am in the 2nd half of the album. starting with "country disappeared." that song sucks. and "solitaire" jeff's voice is double-tracked or manipulated in some way that is very unflattering to the song. and "i'll fight" is generic. and the last track "everlasting everything" is such a pile of generalizations and trite melodies and overwrought strings. it's enough man. i suggest not even listening to the 2nd half of the album, except maybe "sonny feeling," which isn't that great a track either, but it's better than the rest. does jeff get melody anymore? did he ever? was jay the melody-maker? cause there are zero to zero melodies on this album. the music is mostly uninteresting. the lyrics are banal and jejune. i really thought i understood why the band made sky blue sky after the intricately played and performed a ghost is born. i thought they needed a break from that type of sound/recording and just wanted to cut a new album of some fresh, albeit simple tunes. great. i'm all for it. but what is happening now? is this a pattern? is this a settling?

this lineup reads like a murderer's row of musicians. but they've produced nothing together. there is no excitement. there is no angst. there's no tension in the band. they're all nice/unassuming personalities. and that's not working. i think they have one incredible album in them. but this ain't it. and sky blue sky wasn't it.

anyway, this isn't my review. this is just me venting. be prepared to read more about this album and how utterly clueless i am about what this band has turned into.

right now

vote for legs against arms to win the hot sauce race.

you can vote every day, once a day. do it! do it now! 1, 2, 3, do it!

sonny feeling

what a day thus far. i picked up wilco's new album and grizzly bear's too finally. both only 9.99 at best buy. i haven't listened to all of either one of them yet. the cd play on my laptop starts whirling and the fan gets really loud and then i can't hear the music unless i turn it up really loud and then if i do that, i can't hear anything else in the office. so they're in the car, waiting for me.

speaking of wilco, the avclub has graded the new wilco album.

plus, time did a little Q&A with the tweedster. he speaks briefly about jay.

i had a hell of a time finding out what green shoots were. apparently, i wasn't the only one.

enterprise is shaking and making deals here in houston. and it's not the rental car place. it's the energy place. didn't know about it eh? well it's now one big bad energy company. we've those here before in houston. some of them don't exist anymore.

here are the dumbest moments in business, thus far in 2009.

i'll fight

i'm momentarily suspending my title tribute to william joel in honor of the release of "wilco the album" tomorrow. i'm actually listening to "you never know" right now. tuesday at 9a.m. the best buy on richmond opens and i'm going to be here, cash in hand. i think it will make the perfect soundtrack to my fourth of july extravaganza, which consists of diet soda, my wife and a movie and lots of boxes. and the cat. by the way, pitchfork gave it a 7.3. i'm shocked.

this weekend was a pretty good one. we drank wine and watched austrailia, which was about three hours of ridiculousness and predictableness, but still pretty good. what is hugh jackman eating? that dude is ripped. i think he could beat the crap out of carrot top, which is saying alot because carrot top has turned into a muscular monster.

saturday we got to packing a lot. but it got so hot, we couldn't really concentrate anymore and we were getting really agitated, so we went to the movies. we saw "away we go," which if you're married, that's a good movie to watch. if you're not married, it's a good movie to watch because the relationship between the two characters is something you hardly see in movies. they actually love each other. and care about each other. it was refreshing to see that for a change. plus it's pretty funny. we saw it at the river oaks theater. i love that place. it's old-style movie watching.

sunday we got back to packing and ran some errands. made it to the gym. that's about it.

wilco the blog post

wilco at the mountain winery in california.

got a clip of "hummingbird." check it out.

my life

i was really too young when "thriller" came out to get how groundbreaking the video was or what a cultural force this one album had become. i really didn't get how big michael jackson was until the early 90's when he released the "dangerous" album. i remember fox, which at that time was still struggling to become the fourth network, debuted the "black or white" video with macaulay culkin. i remember thinking, "how big is this dude that they moved back their regular programming for his video?" and they did it again for "remember the time." but it wasn't long after that, that the rumors and allegations and lawsuits started. and he quickly turned into a punchline. not a real human. he wasn't human to us. he was a fantasy figure existing in our realm of reality, something artificial, something innocent, but broken. the 80's were michael jackson, bill cosby and coke for me. i don't partake of any of those things anymore, but i'm still sad to see them go. i'm sad to see them go because we all knew those things. i'm not sure what we all know anymore.

lester bangs said this about elvis when he died: "but i can guarantee you one thing; we will never agree on anything as we agreed on elvis. so i won't bother saying goodbye to his corpse. i will say goodbye to you."

i don't know how, but that perfectly fits what i feel.

excellent article from time: the death of peter pan.

evidently the simpsons will be the death of television. bring it on.

plans

grizzly bear covered by band of horses.

the words forming in your mouth: whoa shit. or cank sure. it's 50/50.

or tartar sauce. it's less than 50/50. it's 40/40. i don't think that's right.

embryonic

possible album cover for flaming lips new album. nice.

the kids

lou reed's berlin is an audio representation of a nightmare. the listening experience is brutal. it is desolate, it is desirable, it is completely devoid of human comfort. lou goes out of his way to beat you over the head with misery. the kids screaming at the end of "the kids" is intolerable. the little boy screaming "mommy!" makes your eyes glaze over and stare ahead and eventually lie behind your eyelids for security. it makes your heart beat slower and your breathing grows longer.

it's 4a.m. and lou is singing "and this is the room where she took the razor and cut her wrists that strange and fateful night, and I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling, and I said, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, what a feeling."

i'm almost thankful i broke that cd that night.

pot kettle black

"i, myself, have found a real rival in myself."

-jeff tweedy

say goodbye to hollywood

in the words of william joel: "so many faces in and out of my life, some will last, some will just be now and then, life is a series of hellos and goodbyes, i'm afraid it's time for goodbye again." william joel, telling us that life isn't permanent, that the people we know are not permanent and that it should be appreciated before it's gone. william joel everyone.

with this recent depression still in our minds, i have to ask, will we actually change our behavior from just a few years ago? will we realize how irrational, unsustainable our behaviors had become? we'll see.

the government is giving money to tesla to build a new car. i hope they don't mean these guys.

elizabeth warren is a professor at harvard, but more importantly she's the chairman of the congressional oversight panel of TARP. and while i'm not sure how well she's doing overseeing TARP, i do enjoy listening to her when she speaks. she is clear, she is honest and i believe she has good intentions. here is her suggestion for moving forward.

i've read several reviews of the new sunset rubdown album and i can't wait to hear it.

i heard the news today, oh boy

jay bennett died of an accidental prescription drug overdose.

shit man.

famous last words

by the way, a week from today, the new wilco album comes out. i know i've bashed it pretty good, but i'll be there front and center tuesday afternoon putting down my cash for a copy. i will probably also buy a chick-fil-a sandwich because there's one right next to best buy on richmond.

worse comes to worst

the piano man. the album starts out with what sounds like someone blowing on a jug and it ends with a song about masturbation and dying in a swimming pool. that's why this album is a classic. william joel put it all together for this album. and although he's characterized as a singer/songwriter from the 70's/80's, he was always different to me. guys like james taylor, jim croce or jackson browne were writers of sweet/pretty tunes, which william joel did too. but william joel wrote with a snarl of attitude, he was like a little punk, that kid in school who was 5'6 but would fight you no matter what. that's william joel.

ed mcmahon is dead. he was 86. he was found in a closet tied with by his hands and genitals. i'm kidding. that only happens in thailand. there was a joke on snl weekend update with dennis miller years ago that said there was a break in the kennedy assassination because they had an audio tape that captured the three shots during the motorcade and then someone yelling "YES!" like ed mcmahon used to do on the tonight show. that joke always hung around with me.

derivatives are still around. in some circles, their image is changing from months ago. is that correct? or that is already memory lag from the fall?

ben bernanke could be out of a job come jan. 31. it's highly unlikely, but look for some image control as we get closer to that date.

this website/blog is pretty cool. it takes us day by day concurrently with the present day through 1930. so if you click it today, you can read about june 23, 1930. pretty sweet.

"worse comes to worst, i'll get along, i don't know how, but sometimes i can be strong." the words of william martin joel.

go to extremes

i think instead of using random song titles for each blog entry, i will now only use the song stylings of mr. william joel. cause every time i see "anthony's song (movin' out)," i get a smile on my face. and that's what william joel does best, he makes people smile and enjoy life. i was riding my bike the other day and "uptown girl" came on. i probably looked like the queerest dude in the neighborhood on my bike because i was riding with no hands and dancing while i was riding. it was a great moment that perfectly symbolized the shot used as credits roll at the end of a movie. it was that momentous.

i've complained publicly and privately about the quality of wilco's (jeff tweedy's) lyrics going downhill. here is a song though that is still lyrically exciting.

michael lewis was on charlie rose the other night. check it out here.

lots of big names give the best advice they ever got. my best advice: life is only as good as your last sandwich.

here's an interview with sonic youth on pitchfork. never been a big fan of their's, but i respect their creativity and longevity.

the two girls in front of me are talking how gross it is to have dead skin on your lips. they're going through how to get rid of it. one suggestion is putting lip balm on your lips when you go to bed. another is a thicker version of vasoline called aquafore (?). they're still going on about this. i went from downtown in the tunnel, where it's happening, to sitting here listening to this shit. i got to get back downtown.

now she's talking in armenian. wow. this is so brutal. i'm putting my headphones on.

anthony's song (movin' out)

we signed the lease. we're moving.

i have no idea how we'll put this off, but we will.

the ballad of el goodo

sammy sosa's name is apparently on the 2003 steroid list. this list is compiled of players who tested positive before baseball implemented its new, strict anti-performance enhancing drugs policy. first off, no shit sammy sosa's name is on there. that dude went from a scrawny kid from the d.r. to this behemoth in like a year. he went from hitting 10 home runs to hitting 60 in like two years. so that's no big surprise. what bothers me is the double standards in sports. if a guy gets caught using steroids in baseball, his career is over. just like that. no coming back. i mean jason giambi might be the lone exception. in football, guys take steroids and get suspended like shawn merrimen and almost win defensive player of the year awards. they don't get run out of the game. i don't understand that. also, what about this guy? donte stallworth is driving drunk and kills someone. he gets 30 days and he'll be back playing this year or the next. does that make sense to you? you take steroids, you're out forever. you kill someone, well, we'll let you back in after you serve time in your house. what the f?

what is going on iran? these people are pissed. i like their spirit. i like how the internet, meaning twitter and facebook, two simple web applications are being used to drive home their story and send images around the world. no dictator can stop that.

obama introduced sweeping financial reforms today. check it out here.

big star released number one record and radio city again. i'm not sure why. i don't think there's extra stuff on it and i don't think they've been remastered. but great stuff anyway.

randy, i still listen to burgers. i actually listen to it while i take a bath. i relax in some hot water and listen to burgers vols. 1 and 2. thanks again.

i had a stuffed snapper today that was heroic in taste and flavor. wow. i also had oatmeal. it was less tasty. but good for me.

iowa city adieu

this engagement is nice. it's in downtown and i've been eating lunch in the tunnel. the tunnel is great. although it has no bathrooms. seriously. not one.

oh yeah

a friend of mine sent this to me who works at fox sports. she said this aired yesterday during an angels game.

free ride

"free ride." can you believe it? i missed "free ride." one of the partners here has gotten wind that i'm a rock and roll encyclopedia and he's taken to asking me to name the group for each song that he names. and i missed free ride. anybody know it? it's the edgar winter group. yeah, i know. what the hell? i've gotten most of his questions, but he's found my soft spot which is late 60's, early 70's soul, groups like the spinners, the ohio players and billy preston. i'm not as familiar with that as i should be. free ride. damn.

there's all kind of stuff going on out there (iran elections, switch from analog to digital, and other stuff that i don't care about on a friday.

by the way, looks like we're moving again. i know, it never gets old, does it?

"If I am the one
Blood on the sofa
Blood in the sink
Blood in the trunk
High at the wheel of a bull black nova
And I’m sorry as a setting sun
This can’t be undone
This can’t be outrun"

what is going on with those lyrics? freakin' me out man. by the way, i had a sandwich today and i had the realization that a sandwich without mayonaisse is just a sandwich. mayonaisse actually makes the sandwich. it really does. cheese is optional. lettuce optional. i think these rules apply to a hamburger as well, but that has not been tested yet. further results may differ.

hoodoo voodoo

garn- st. germain depository institutions act.

depository institutions deregulation and monetary control act.

obviously these are just small wiki pages, but i haven't found more than that yet.

3 rounds and a sound

2nd post of the day.

i haven't posted from mish lately, but he's got a plan to save the fed's image. he has this because the fed is investing in actually improving their image. i think bernanke should shave his beard and start wearing stone-washed jordache.

here's more on fractional reserve lending and how it, and the fiat economy, are undermining our banking/financial institutions.

also, the real worry i have, besides massive infectious disease and deepening socio-economic divisions, is the great debt threat. it's coming if something isn't done and the worst thing is, to do something about it, is going to hurt. all of us.

they done wrong/we done wrong

another day, another swing in the move/won't move movement. after searching endlessly, we have one more place to see tonight. after tonight, if this place isn't the one, it's starting to feel like we're going to suck it up, pay the new rent rate and work feverishly to find jobs out of state before the end of our lease is up. that seems to be the new game plan. although the game plan is constantly evolving. the game plan like ten minutes ago was to move to arizona and raise komodo dragons. but that game plan is already gone. see, they move quick.

i had a quick epiphany last night. my wife was supposed to cook some chicken for us for lunch, but due to her mom calling and unleashing more of her middle-aged drama, she didn't get a chance to do it. but i brought it up how the chicken would go bad if she didn't cook it because it had already thawed out and was just sitting in the fridge. so she trudged downstairs, upset, and went to cook it. now this is about 10:15p.m. when this happened. now usually, i as the husband who never forgets and always has the nightly outline laid out and signed off on, would have continued to lay in bed and read for my CPA test. but this time, it flashed in front of my eyes. she's going down there to do this for me. she didn't forget because she was lazy or watching television. she forgot because she's always dealing with her mom's crap and she became upset about her mom and therefore forgot. don't punish her. the punishment of an irresponsible, immature mother is enough. so i grabbed a book (a heartbreaking work of staggering genius by david eggers) and i went downstairs with her and read to her while she cooked. she loves when i read to her. it's these little breakthroughs that i hope to continue to have that keep my marriage a successful, happy one. it not always easy hearing about her family and how they're always purposefully butchering their lives, but it's not her fault.

sweet leaf tea is the best.

here is a quick scene from the office where jim dresses as dwight in the cold open and dwight repays the favor in the close. check it out. it's actually very funny when seen onscreen:

Jim: [Dressed as Dwight] It's kind of blurry. [puts on his glasses] That's better. [exhales] Question. What kind of bear is best?
Dwight: That's a ridiculous question.
Jim: False. Black bear.
Dwight: Well that's debatable. There are basically two schools of thought---
Jim: Fact. Bears eat beets. Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica.
Dwight: Bears do not--- What is going on--- What are you doing?!

Dwight: [walks in dressed as Jim] Pam.
Pam: Hey, Dwight. You look really nice today.
Dwight: [scoffs] Pssssh. I look like an idiot. Hey Karen.
Karen: Hey, Dwight, lookin' sharp.
Dwight: Yeah, that's cause I'm... you're boyfriend, Jim Halpert. Hey, Karen, wanna get t-together later and have sexual intercourse cause you're my girlfriend?
Jim: Do you?
Karen: No.
Jim: OK.
Karen: I'm good. Thanks.
Jim: [Dwight imitates the "Jim face"] Look at that.
Dwight: I'm Jim Halpert. [more horrible "Jim faces"]
Jim: Spot on.
Dwight: Ah-luh-luh, a little comment. Muh.

foux da fa fa

having lunch with a friend is great. get out of the office, have some laughs. very good monday thus far.

we're going to look at two different properties today and tomorrow. i haven't mentioned this before, but it looks like we might be moving. we'll still be here in houston, but our lease is up and our landlord is being a little bit crazy in her approach to negotiating. so we've taken it upon ourselves to begin searching for a new place. i think we might have found one that we're going to see tonight. moving will be a major bitch, but by moving we'll be sticking it to the landlord and her "chance to make some money" will turn into her financial black hole.

foux da fa fa.

as jon stewart helped to point out when he pantsed jim cramer a few months back, financial television is a mess. bloomberg television is actually pretty good, but the beast in question is CNBC, which had the market cornered for financial/business news and still leads the market by quite a bit. i have no numbers, but i can tell from the coverage on blogs/websites. this guy has 16 suggestions on how to fix it and most of them are pretty good.

the federal government's money is being spent too slow apparently, which i didn't think was possible. but obama says speed it up. he wants to create 600,000 jobs by the end of this summer. when compared to the 10% of the workforce out of work, that's really nothing, but it's a start.

top 10 housing markets for the next 10 years. i've looked at fort collins. looked at it, i haven't visited it. but i can see it from my house.

so did the government get it right by not buying bad assets before with TARP money?

if you have a macy's card, apparently that's one of the worst credit cards to have in the world. the world! but also if you have a macy's card, you're probably in love with yourself or hate yourself. this is all true. so here's some really bad credit cards to have.

love and mercy

love and mercy.

two weeks

yes, grizzly bear is blowing my mind. they actually have a song on the dark is the night compilation album called deep blue sea and it's amazing. the national have a song on there too that's incredible.

david carradine is dead. i had never seen him in anything until kill bill, which i thought he was strangely calm and unnerving. his superman speech is great.

this is nice: a worrier's guide to economic recovery. after all these months of pessisism (sp?), could we really be coming out of it? can i believe yet?

because then you read something like this that says rising interest on the world's debts will continue to sap growth.

look at this prius!! it gets 50 mpg! that's incredible!!! wow. i want one.

kicking television

did anyone catch the entire "earth 2100" last night? i only caught the last 45 minutes of it. i'm going to try and find it on the web and watch the whole thing. it deals with the possible environmental ramifications of our actions if we do not accept that our current way of life is unsustainable. i've been making this joke lately that my mom and other baby boomers don't really appreciate, but at least they laugh. the baby boomers experienced the most perfect period of life on this planet. they were raised during u.s. dominance and they matured and grew older when stocks were high, land was cheap and medicine was advancing. they could run their air conditioners all day and they could drive their inefficient cars as much as they wanted. but that period is ending. and the aftermath will fall on us.

i have no scientific data to back this up. but i'm not an idiot. i've seen changes in my life. i've seen the choices we have made about how we live, work and surround ourselves with exploits of life. so i wonder, what will change during my lifetime? i wonder if world leaders are determined enough/smart enough to really get a handle on the seriousness of the situation. do they understand what raising sea levels will be like? do they really understand how fast disease will spread when changing temperatures allow it to permeate and breed much more easier in areas where it used to be uncommon? do they understand that globalization will end overnight if our infrastructure is challenged and compromised? and it really wouldn't take much for that to happen.

one of the reasons i want to leave houston so bad is because i would love to live in a city where a car is not a necessity. i dream of the idea of waking up, grabbing a book and hopping on a train and reading the whole way to work, or listening to a new album. it would make my life so much easier and cheaper and also help the environment around me. i see all these condos going up inside the loop here in houston and i wonder, how do they plan on moving all these people around? cause each high-rise will have about 100-200 tenants and each one of those people will get into their car and drive to work everyday. they have no choice.

we've taken "the old ways" and we've industrialized them. what happens when we have to go back to the old ways? we'll have to have a garden and grow our own crops and possibly raise our own animals to eat. and think of all the advancements that have been stored in some electronic database that will be lost. it all seems so pointless when you think about it in these terms. why did we advance ourselves to the point where we ended our civilization?

and i'm not saying these things as a means of scare-mongering. this is real stuff. our actions have consequences. our choices have consequences. we never realized we were partners with the earth and maybe we never will. but the earth knows we're just renting from her. and she'll evict us eventually if we don't change. i know we have the technology to do this. but do we have the stomach? it's got to be our generation that mandates these changes, otherwise, when we're 70, we won't recognize the world around us.

so what changes can you make right now around you? well not big ones. but you can change your light bulbs. you can insulate your house and install thicker windows that don't leak. you can grow a garden. you can ride your bike or take the bus/train/lightrail if you can. i know in texas that's not easy/plausible. you can use re-usable bags instead of plastic bags. you can turn down your water heater a few degrees and maybe your a/c too. that's also not easy in texas summers. i don't have any grand ideas for your everday life. those will have to come from somewhere else. but imagine a world where your car is electric and you drive to work/home and you plug into something like a carport that is outfitted with solar polars that are used to recharge your car. those are the kinds of ideas we need to get behind.

anyway, i just think our lives will be so much simpler when we do make this leap. our generation will experience the worst. we'll have to work out the kinks and pay the highest prices for this change-over. i'm ready to do it. i can't wait to see it.

the good part

apparently this song is on the war on war single. the good part. check it out. it's a little tasty tune.

what is the deal with this jon and kate make eight or something? who are these people? i had never heard of them until like two weeks ago and now everywhere i go, i see their faces or i'm staring at their pictures in line at the grocery store. did these people have eight babies and they were given a tv show? is that what's happening here? man, i really want to punch these people in the leg. like real hard for interferring in my life. i also had gone this long without hearing that old scottish woman sing until last night when my wife had on the jimmy kimmel show and she was singing. i was proud of myself for going this long without hearing her. it's not that she's bad, it's just that i do not appreciate cultural phenoms thrust down my throat. or hot pizza bagels.

here is an important piece of journalism...can white women and black women get along. i thought oprah was bringing all the women together. oprah has let me down.

during the summertime, the avclub does reviews of old classic television shows while the real shows are on hiatus. newsradio is one of them. it's in my top five of all-time sitcoms/television comedies which are numbered as such:

1. arrested development
2. seinfeld
3. newsradio
4. the simpsons
5. cheers

number six would be out of this world.

"would you like to swing on a star, oh oh oh, carry meanbeams home in a jar, oh oh oh, and be better off than you are, oh oh oh, or would you rather go to earth?"

deep blue sea

it's already a big day. GM filed for bankruptcy. that is huge. GM was one of those pillars of american business. you had coca-cola, johnson and johnson and stuff like that. GM was in that bunch. now it's gone, owned by the government. also, a freaking plane disappeared over the atlantic. apparently it ran into some lightening and freaking disappeared.

more than two people read this blog. i stand corrected. by christmas of 2011, this blog will be seen by four to four point five people. aim high.

pretty good article from the new york times about banks digging in their heels against regulations even when the business they were trying to protect was disintergrating.

the new republic does a write-up on arianna huffington. it's not pretty. she has a website called the huffington post, which i use from time to time for stories on this blog.

this guy has ideas about how to spend stimulus money. like instead of spending it on parking lots or signs for blind people, we can spend it on outfitting our buildings/homes/public arenas with green appliances/techonology.

i saw the wrestler this weekend. and while it was a great movie, because i used to get really into wrestling and kind of followed some of the guys careers and my cousin wrestled in humble for quite a while, the story was a little predictable to me. but the performance of mickey rourke was outstanding. he was great. i think everyone should check it out.

cuddly toy

ever heard of the "smell test"? i'm sure you have. somebody tells you something and you think, that sounds like bullshit. your friends do it, your family does it. everybody does it, but not everybody implements the smell test. it's very important you do. because smelling bullshit can be a great and powerful tool in your life. everytime one of these banks comes out with its quarterly report and claims big profits, i think, that smells like shit. and it is. it's accounting tricks. it's hiding liabilities. it's all make believe and they're doing it for short-term profits and public perception. but what they miss is that no one, no one is going to invest in a bank where they use accounting trickery, especially if they get burned twice. and long term, these institutions will fail because, quite simply, we won't have anymore money to bail them out with.

remember when i was saying how oil will balloon once this depression ends and we'll be faced with another oil spike? well the depression isn't even over and has anyone else noticed how much gas keeps creeping up? here is a profile of dave hughes, another peak oil believer. in 2030, i'll only be 50. if i make it to 2050, i'll be 70. those last years could be really depressing if we don't figure a way out of this.

what is with these huge chinese basketball players? i mean really? 7'6'! that's outstanding. how are they growing these dudes?

we still don't know what killed jay bennett and this guy doesn't want to know.

the avclub did a list of the worst book to movie adaptations. i've seen some of these and some were actually pretty good, but this list focuses on the author's hatred for the movie.

i'm trying my hardest, but i just don't get what's so great about the kings of leon. the only two people who read this blog, love that band. i'm trying guys. i'm trying.

yoshimi battles the pink robots

i had to post this today. i've been giving lance zierlein a hard time because he's 39 and he's talking about nintendo being a part of his generation. if you don't know who he is, he's a radio host on a morning sports show here in houston. i love the show and also he has a blog on chron.com where he posts things. so i went after him. here is the exchange (these posts occurred throughout the day, you can read them here):

kevin: your generation is the nintendo generation? seriously. you had a spirograph for ten years and when that little baby wore out, you moved on to your jordache stone-washed jeans phase and your slap-bracelets. come on!

lance: Nintendo. RBI, Punchout, Contra. Come on, fool.

kevin: dude, you're 39, so you were 17 when RBI baseball and punchout came out. sorry lance, that is past your generation. by that time, you should have been making time with the cheerleaders and not at home figuring out how to beat soda popinski.
come on, fool.

lance: "Making time with the cheerleaders"??? Who are you - Bing Crosby? My generation played past the age of 18. We went from Nintendo to Sega to Playstation to PS2 and beyond. In college we played basketball, went to class, went out drinking, came back late and night and gambled on Double Dribble or Golf. That's how we did it.

kevin: when bing crosby wasn't making time with the cheerleaders or singing christmas ballads with david bowie, he was beating his kids with a bag full of brass door knobs, not playing ninja gaiden and figuring out the power glove. if there was a game where you got drunk and verbally assaulted people, bing would have commanded that game. he would have known the code for extra lives and beaten fred savage's little half-wit brother and bing would have been crowned the wizard.

lance: Best of the day.

we'll miss you jay

jay bennett died yesterday. he was only 45 years old. i'd just written about that dude and how much i miss him in my favorite band, wilco. i'd read something one time that said he'd been in something like nine car accidents and evidently he was about to have hip replacement surgery because of a fall from a concert back when he was with titantic love affair. he smoked like a fiend too. but man, 45 is young. i started wondering about jay bennett's place and it bothered me that no one would ever really remember him like me, how even though wilco was jeff's band, jay brought jeff's songs to life. but i got an email from bruce saying how he thought summerteeth was wilco's best album. and that made me think that there were plenty more people out there that loved summerteeth and maybe they didn't know why or maybe yankee hotel foxtrot was their favorite record or maybe they thought wilco wasn't the same after yankee hotel foxtrot. those people might not know the name "jay bennett" but without knowing his name or anything about him, they listened and they heard jay bennett. and that's what is important. jay brought to life "being there," "summerteeth," and "yankee hotel foxtrot." and for that, his place in rock history is secure by me.

i read this article yesterday and it blew me away. it's not really an article, but a group of some guys i've been reading lately: niall ferguson, paul krugman, nouriel roubini and others sitting around discussing the way to economic recovery. they actually might not be sitting around, they be on the phone or standing up, but anyway, it's a great read. i actually tried to print it out, but i ran out of ink. i hate ink.

america and argentina: quite similar when you look back.

i hope everyone enjoys their day today.

airline to heaven

it's been a while. i haven't really been doing anything. i've been going to the gym. that's right, i'm huge. muscles on top of muscles. actually i'm starting to wonder how good my body produces muscle, that maybe my body type (frame) won't allow me to hold mass. because i'm lifting the same, if not more, than some ripped dudes in the gym, but i don't look like them. my lanky muscles are squandering my hopes for a chiseled frame.

anyway, you ever heard of an economist called "dr. doom"? well his name is nouriel roubini and i've mentioned him a few times on this blog. here's a write-up about the guy.

so which country holds the most debt as a percentage of GDP? you'd probably guess the united states. you'd be wrong. way wrong. the reason: as a percentage of GDP. in terms of fiscal dollars, yeah, we're holding a lot of debt, but as a percentage of our GDP, we're not in the top ten.

are we finally at a point where suburbia is being questioned? well, high-end suburbia anyway.

england's debt gets downgraded and now we're worried about the same thing happening to us.

i hope everyone enjoys their weekend. i'll be seeing some friends, here and there. take it easy.

el scorcho

i am really jonesing over two bands lately: blind pilot and white rabbits. blind pilot just did a hearya session and they sound amazing. they're totally live on those recordings. they sound incredible. tanner's been all over this band for a while now and i've recently succumb to how good they are. something about those live sessions really bring out these amazing pure sounds and the vocals are totally inspired. the other band is white rabbits. their new album was produced by britt daniel, of spoon fame. anyway, i've only heard the opening track gun percussion and it's great. the album came out today and i'm assuming the hype machine will have more tracks soon. i've been digging some camera obscura lately too.

so i finally purchased these books i've been waiting to buy. one of them is lords of finance by liaquat ahamed. here is an article where he has lunch and says stuff. check it out.

"catacomb, catacomb, be my security." i have no idea what that means, but i can't get it out of my head.

here is an interview with myron scholes who wrote the rules on financial risk with the black-scholes model. i certainly love the photo used. this guy is a financial genius, even though his theory was relied on too heavily, proving major cracks in the logic, but this picture, it looks like he's starring in a sitcom on abc TGIF after full house.

naill ferguson's always good for a reality check. here he is telling us we live in a land of diminished returns and excess regulation is unnecessary.

"catacomb, catacomb, be my security."

california is out of control and dealing with major budget issues, like passing one.

informer

breaking news:

i just ate hot pockets for the first time in probably five years and they were good. they were some sort of quesadilla hot pockets and i ate them both. i think most people eat both of them. although, now that i'm done, my stomach is gurgling and i'm wondering where this is all going to end up.

are the sonic guys still funny? is the "hey bro" commercial considered a classic sonic guys commercial? i don't know. i like the "hey bro" but i don't think it's classic. there hasn't been a really good one for a while. i'm glad they're still trying though. keep working sonic guys. this country needs you.

i listened to the wilco album the other day, well most of it. i actually turned it off because i had other things to do and i was pretty disappointed too. there's some interesting stuff, like in bull black nova. it does somewhat sound like a television rip-off at some points, but speaking of rip-offs there is a total rip-off of george harrison's my sweet lord in one of the songs, i can't remember the name. you'll hear it. and the duet with feist, what is that about? i'm sure i'll come around and say i like it, but it's not classic and i feel it's a step-backwards in my opinion.

plus i've been having this conversation in my head about bands. it's like with most writers, there's a window. when that window is open, you come up with amazing stuff. but when it closes, you still come up with good stuff, but not like you did before. it doesn't come as easy and, if you're honest with yourself, it's not as good. now, take that theory and think about how few albums bands put out now-a-days. the beatles put out like an album a year. the beach boys, sometimes two. now, it takes bands two to three years to put out an album. therefore, the window is closing and because the band has put out so little product, we think the window should still be open. but it's not about product, it's about time. that time is passing and regardless of whether you've put out two albums or twelve albums, the window closes. my example is bob dylan. i love me some bob dylan. but look at his career. the real creamy stuff he did came from 1964 to 1966. that's it. two years! once he did blonde on blonde, that was it for that bob dylan. his music changed. his lyrics changed. he wasn't the same performer, he wasn't the same writer and he never was again. yes, blood on the tracks and desire have incredible moments, but you cannot for a second tell me that the lyrical imagery from those two albums compares with highway 61 and blonde on blonde. there's no way. so for dylan, his window was wide open until 1966 and then it started to close. that's peak production. it's hard to recognize when you're going through it. you really can only recognize it through hindsight.

wilco's put out, by my count, seven albums since 1993. and they've slowly built up an impressive catalog. but my thinking is that jeff's window is closing or has closed. he as a songwriter has peaked. i liked sky blue sky for what it was, but it was also a notice to me that things have changed. i really liked a ghost is born. some people didn't. it was weird and all over the place. but i can almost look back now and say, that was it. that was the point where wilco stopped making amazing, creative, perplexing, confusing records and started making records. and that's fine. the window was open for summerteeth, yankee hotel foxtrot and a ghost is born. i'll accept that. and i'll keep listening. but man, they used to be so good, they were sick.

by the way, argument number two, the band is better with jay bennett. it's not the same band. it doesn't have the same feel. i know he wasn't on a ghost is born, but look at the three albums since jay left and you have to notice the drop-off in melody, in production methods and varied instrumentation. i miss jay bennett.

any points?

that birdhouse (the song)

the new wilco album is available for streaming on their website. i haven't really had an opportunity to listen to it yet. i'm going to when i get home. i tried here at work, but everytime there's a computer message, like where a message screen pops up, there is a loud beep that is so loud it actually hurts my brain. so i decided for the health of my brain, to wait until i got home where i could control the beeps and not slowly crumble from the inside out.

does anyone remember the dana carvey show? well it's finally been released on DVD. i remember that show was a bizarre, mish-mosh of amazing comedy and amazing crap. some of my favorite sketches like skinheads from maine, and where tom brokaw has to pre-record all these wild scenarios before he goes on vacation like former president gerald ford being mauled by lions and how delicious he was. and then there were skits where bill clinton is nursing a pig and kitty kats tell you the news or something. but it was worth watching especially considering it came on in 1996 or something and it was after or before home improvement. remember that steaming pile of crap? yeah, well this show probably freaked out everyone who loved home improvement. check it out.

i keep hearing about underwriting and decided to stop being confused and read about it.

i haven't had any caffeine today and i'm starting to get a headache. but i'm almost done with work and it hasn't been too bad. plus i'll be home soon and i can workout tonight.

as most of you know, i have sbcglobal as my email carrier. today they're doing these advertisements for teeth cleaning. so everytime i go to check my mail i'm greeted with these horrible before and after pictures of people's teeth. some of them are pretty bad. and they're close-ups.

pork soda

i have finally figured it out! it's the soda. of course! the caffeine is killing me. not really killing me, but turning me into a zombie. how does caffeine turn you into a zombie you ask? oh you didn't ask? well then forget it. but if you're interested, here's how it does.

i don't really start to feel awake until i go to the gym usually around 7 or 8 in the evening. i feel tired and sleepy all day and then finally i get to sweat and burn some calories. this desk job is harder than i thought it would be. i keep thinking of ways to add a little exercise to it, like replace my chair with a workout ball or turn my desk into a standing post. i'm not sure those would fly in my office, but it's worth a shot. i think i'm sleeping too much too. you have to vidulent when you get older. if things start feeling different, you got to start using placebos and control techniques. i don't even know what i'm saying.

i was looking over the book i wrote like three/four years ago. it's actually pretty good. i'm re-typing it and adding some stuff here and there to make it better. i'm thinking about sending it to oprah once i'm done. i'm serious. i'm going to send it to oprah, she'll read it, then tell everyone to read it and they will because she said so and then i'll be a millionaire and i workout right away in the morning and feel awake all day. and eat oatmeal with blueberries. and toast. and pancakes. i'm thinking about starting a phrase that reads: "it's better than pancakes." i'll use it if something is really good. i think people will appreciate it if i tell them that they're better than pancakes.

monday

i'm referring to the wilco song "monday" from being there. speaking of wilco, has anyone seen their new album cover for the album coming out in june? it can be seen right here. what is that? i don't know what to do with that. i kind of laugh, but then my forehead crinkles a bit and i stop laughing and start really studying the picture. if this is any indication, this album is going to be wild. apparently this guy at billboard has already heard the album. he's a got a mini-review here.

did anyone watch SNL this saturday? usually i don't, but the wife was out of town and i had nothing to do and also justin timberlake was hosting. i know people are going to start making jokes, loud, inappropriate jokes, about me liking justin timberlake. but that dude is funny! and his music is actually really good, but more importantly, he's funny. he makes fun of himself and he's good at it. they had a parody song about mother's day. it was hilarious. check it out somewhere.

i have no political news today. i've been working non-stop since like 9a.m. so i've no time. i'm heading home to eat some cereal and watch the simpsons.

beyond here lies nothing

here are the preliminary results from the stress tests (i actually wrote "testes" and had to erase it. sometimes the mistake is better).

also here's an entry from the same blog about fractional reserve lending. i've made some entries here before about it. what does everyone think about fractional reserve lending? is it legal? is it beneficial? is it appropriate?

ron paul is a man against the machine. here's his thoughts on FRL.

i was listening to elbow yesterday. totally great line: "i sat you down and told you how the truest love that's ever found is for oneself, you pulled apart my theory with a weary and disinterested sigh."

a gift

dom deluise died today and i didn't find out until like five minutes ago. that is unacceptable. that man was in smokey and the bandit!

so postings will be few and far between. i'm also getting serious about the cpa exam, so i'll need time to study. but i'll pop in and out when i feel the need to rant.

this is what i'm listening to RIGHT NOW! give it time to load. it will. or contracted: it'll.

yet another movie

this weekend was sweet. 3-day weekend. first full weekend for quite some time. it was nice. the wife and i went to austin and rode the greenbelt. the next day we went canoeing, saw some friends and headed home. i always love being in austin. the minute i stepped back on the greenbelt, i felt great. it was so nice to be back there. i love it. the creek was dry, only a trickle of water at sculpture falls. the wife jumped in the water that was there. i didn't. it was cold, cold water and the sun wasn't too bright, so i stayed out. plus we saw a snake. i threw rocks at it, which is the scientific response when viewing a snake. we also saw a snake when we went canoeing. it was big and it was right next to the boat. i mean seriously, two foot away from the boat. we freaked out, which is the normal response when seeing a snake by your boat. i stopped by waterloo. went to the bookstore. it was a great weekend. now i'm back and i only have to work 40 hours a week again!

if anyone believes that these banks are actually making profits, you're drinking the kool-aid. these are accounting tricks and some smoke and some mirrors. the overall US financial system is being propped up. otherwise, it would collapse.

warren buffet wants to buy wells fargo.

here's a bio of al dunlap.

if friday night lights played varsity blues, who would win?

here are some lessons learned from star trek. space lessons.

wah-wah

i just read the timeline of the little boy who died from the pig flu and i'm wondering outloud here: he visited the galleria on april 5th and he goes back home april 8th and gets sick. i wonder if he was sick while he was here?

because the galleria isn't far from where i live, where i work out, where i eat and shop for groceries. and then i suddenly and out of the blue fall ill on april 17th. i have not been sick in any other month other than oct., nov. or dec. since 2004 when i had the flu. weird. and i still am not totally well yet. i wonder....

by the way, saw blue velvet last night. i've been wanting to see a david lynch movie because i knew they were weird/odd. but this was beyond weird/odd, this was amazingly disturbed. i would recommend it to anyone looking to watch a movie that will intrigue them and disturb in an arty way at the same time.

the grass roots and creed bratton

holy crap. creed bratton was in the grass roots. that is cool.

one of my favorite creed moments is when he dyes his hair black and tries to act much younger.

wow.

magnificent

after my months and months of overtime and working non-stop on saturdays, fridays and all days in between, i'm rewarded with: a day off. i'm off this friday. three-day weekend! the wife and i are planning a trip to austin to ride some bikes on the greenbelt. it should be nice after all the rain we've gotten. hopefully the creek is wet and running along. i went one time when the creek was running somewhat high and it was the greatest day. i remember the cold water rushing past us and having to carry our bikes over our heads. finally we made it to the end and hung out on the rocks and enjoyed the serenity. i hope it's like that again.

last night around 3 in the morning, i swear the lightning was so bright, it lit up the entire house for two or three seconds. i thought everything around us was getting struck by lightning. i stayed in bed though. funny how i feel really safe in bed. or maybe i'm still partly asleep to think, "hey, it's falling apart out there, i should probably stay in my pajamas in bed." actually that sounds nice.

so with our armies in iraq and afghanistand (what is afghanistand? that's a typo that i'm leaving in there), and trust me, i hate to bring this up, but what happens if pakistan falls apart? it's not likely, but it's not as unlikely as you think.

don't really have much today. houston is under water and i think there's more on the way.

i saw the ACL lineup this year and i'm excited. i'm totally excited about my buddy leatherbag playing ACL this year! that is insanely great. i'm still in shock. that dude is moving on up. hopefully i'll get to go the day he's playing and try to make him laugh while he's playing. i should wear a bert costume but use an ernie voice.

i'm only sleeping

still not feeling great. all the stuff in my chest has moved back up into my head and my head feels like a balloon with too much air. i can't wait until all this clears up. and then now i'm hearing about some pig flu. what the hell? when did our animals start mutating flu strains to kill us? first it was the birds, now the pigs. these animals are getting out of hand. seriously.

sheila barr says the FDIC should be the one stepping in and taking over banking and bank-holding companies. i'm not so sure i disagree with her.

everyone better get used to the idea of paying taxes for online purchases. it's coming quick.

i've been railing on them for awhile and i'll continue. here's more on how credit card companies hoped to keep people in debt.

here's eric rosenfeld from LTCM talking about the bust that was his company in the late 90's.

anybody have an opinion on the texans draft picks? i have not heard of any of these guys, but most draft experts say it was a good for houston. no idea. i'm predicting 15-1 this year. that's right. you read that correctly.

the underdog

holy crap, i've got such good stuff today. man.

okay, first: i love the psychology argument of investors. economists assume investors to be rational and on top of that make their choices because they have all the necessary information available. both assumptions are wrong and completely false. here is an article where the rational investor argument is blown up. i love it.

another great argument about elizabeth warren who has been put in charge of our beloved TARP money. she makes amazing statements about the insolvency of the american family. she seems to share my hatred/distrust of credit card companies and says american is the only place, i love this, where people save to be bankrupt. that's amazing. read it here.

the "stress-test" results are out and i don't have any links to those but i do have links to the government's methods for testing the stress at the bank. "there's a lot of stress in here. wait...wait.... i just found some more stress. it's over there. see it?"

here is andrew cuomo's letter to the SEC, barney frank, etc. in regards to the BofA merger with Merrill Lynch. lots of juicy stuff in this.

congratulations to my friend ana who got a new job making more money and with a shorter commute. i'm very proud of her.

congratulations to my friend bruce who is going through the final mixes of his band's ep. can't wait to here the results.

and congratulations to me who during a break in songs during the spoon concert, called out opener black nasty. i yelled, "you suck!" and the singer/rapper lowered his head because he knew in his heart i was correct.

"you suck!" very original.

blue in green

this past weekend was my 1st wedding anniversary. i woke up friday morning with a sore throat which progressed into a full-on sinus blow-up over the weekend. also, it rained for the entire day saturday, which meant bike-riding, the international festival and all other outdoor activities were cancelled. so being the industrious couple we are, we changed plans on the fly. saturday we went to the angelika movie theater downtown and watched "the great buck howard" which was one of those movies that no one else, besides you, will ever see. it was actually really good and then we went to the hotel and had dinner. sunday the weather was cleared up and the baseball game was good, despite the fact the astros lost. my wife got an autograph from reds 2nd basemen brandon phillips. it was an old ball i kept in my car to use at the park, so when she handed it to him, he commented, "what the hell happened to this ball?" to which my wife responded, "we used it."

so i'm feeling better today after sleeping almost all day yesterday.

so geitner says the banks are well capitalized. really?

great article on the "wail of the 1%." this opens up a great dialogue about compensation.

kc fed chief is at it again. dude doesn't mind speaking his mind. love it.

in case you didn't know, you can watch all episodes of frontline online.

our next netflix movie is blue velvet. i'm excited.

the bends

I noticed that Capital records has re-released Pablo Honey, The Bends and OK Computer from Radiohead. In recent years, I have proclaimed my favorite band to be Wilco. I’ve listened to them since I was 17 and something about Jeff Tweedy’s lyrics and melodies beat alongside my own ups and downs as someone living and dealing with America. The older I get the more it seems we occupy the same space in thought.

But for a great period of my life, from about 15 to 23, Radiohead defined my vision of music. They defined my musical experience. Starting with OK Computer and ending with Hail to the Thief, I bought every Radiohead record the first day it came out, once even getting caught in the pre-Allison flooding rains to purchase Amnesiac.

Radiohead made albums of frustrating beauty. They were melodic, yet completely distressed. There was anguish, there was loneliness and there was paranoia. Those were characteristics I knew when I was younger. Who has your best interests? Who are your friends? Who’s really in charge? What is coming up ahead?

I first heard Radiohead like everyone else. Creep was huge. I loved it. It was easy, it was nice to listen to in my truck, but I never thought about this band in any other way except, that was nice, see you later. It wasn’t until I was up late one night watching 120 minutes or some show like that on MTV (remember when MTV had videos, videos that weren’t just teeny pop and hip-hop) and the video for Just came on. I remembered the name Radiohead and decided to watch it. It blew my mind. Not only was the song incredible, but the video was original and I still say it’s one of the best videos I’ve ever seen. So I went out the next day and bought The Bends. It was instantly one of my favorite albums of all time. Starting off with Planet Telex and the line, “you can force it but it will not come” and this atmospheric sound and menace. I had no idea what I was listening to, but I loved it. I devoured it. High and Dry, Fake Plastic Trees, Just, Nice Dream, Street Spirit. These songs still resonate in me. I was dumbfounded by how good this little band had become. From Pablo Honey to The Bends is probably the greatest artistic leap I’ve ever experienced. This was a different band. I began preaching to everyone who would listen and those who would not. Radiohead, you gotta listen to Radiohead. But rarely would anyone get excited. Then it came.

OK Computer hit like a hurricane. I bought it the first day it came out and didn’t stop listening to it for about four years. It ranks as one of the greatest albums of all time. Start to finish, it’s leveling. The melodies are four star. The lyrics are disconnected and disjointed, yet as a whole, they form a cohesive response to a world that was beginning to spin too fast and too loose. The next thing I knew Radiohead was huge. But it didn’t make me like them less. I was proud of them. I thought I was witnessing the response to the release of Sgt. Peppers. That is what it felt like, I would think. Because you don’t witness that kind of response to an actual work of art very often. This wasn’t Cher filling stadiums, this was Radiohead, singing about refrigerators buzzing and the karma police. It was amazing.

Since then, they’ve released more great albums (Kid A, In Rainbows) and some okay ones (Amnesiac, Hail to the Thief). And as I’ve gotten older, my identity has shifted some and I now find myself less confused and more comfortable with who I am and those around me. I still feel the world is out to get us, so I will always come back to Radiohead. And I’ll always come back to that time when I 15 hearing “comes like a comet, suckered you but not your friends, one day he’ll get to you and teach you how to be a holy cow, you do it to yourself, you do, and that’s why it really hurts.”

It’s not an understatement to say Radiohead helped shape the way I look at the world. That’s something that will stay with me longer than any song or album.

birds flew backwards

the doves are another band that i wonder why they're not insanely popular.

i usually lead off with the political/economic stuff, but come on, an interview with will arnett. that leads baby. although he doesn't talk about the arrested development movie. that worries me.

"they forget their job is to protect us from the banks, not to protect the banks."

obama bettin' it all on the failed banksters.

the fair value litany.

has everyone done their taxes? today's the day.

the thanks i get

this article perfectly says what i've been trying to say, which is, to stimulate the us economy and entice consumers to spend more will help to jump-start our sagging economy in the short-run, but it will do nothing in the long run and might even jeopardize our situation more.

warren buffet is investing in chinese company that makes electric cars.

you might be billed by the city next time you get into an accident.

i ate a tres leches cake today that was so full of three kinds of milk, it was soaked through the cake. wow. it was from this place.

it's more fun to compute

here's some weekend reading for everyone:

federal reserve history.

bretton woods system.

fractional-reserve banking.

gold standard.

fiat money.

triffin paradox.

have a happy easter holiday.

working week

is anyone else working today?

what the hell....

complicated shadows

i drove up on the curb today doing like 50 mph. it was the coolest thing ever.

remember i mentioned black swans earlier? here's how to avoid them (even though by definition you can't).

listening to the new leatherbag ep. i'm always really grateful when randy sends me his music. i appreciate him thinking enough of me to do that. it's great and i'm really excited for the guy. he's for real.

if you're a fan of these ten tv shows, might start finding something else to do. they might disappear.

the new legs against arms ep will be called come on let's disappear. i like it. can't wait to hear the final version. these guys have been together barely more than a year and they sound like seasoned vets live. can't wait to hear the studio magik.

pidgin english

went to the astros game last night. we won in 10 innings. totally great outcome. i almost got into a fight with a dude who was yelling at us for standing in the ninth inning with jose valverde on the mound. apparently it's against the rules to stand at a baseball game. so i had to lay down the law for the dude. he totally backed down. pathetic actually.

i'm not really finding any good articles lately.

so here's a list of stuff in my car:

1. box of tissues
2. three bottles of water, empty
3. cds
4. peanuts
5. lint roller
6. two reusable grocery bags
7. three wool hats (it's not winter anymore, those need to go)
8. workout gloves
9. stamps
10. fiber bars (stay away from these, mess you up)
11. more cds
12. gum
13. two tennis rackets
14. spare tire

that's it. there's also loose change, a battery and several rodents. that's not true. i collected the loose change.

but i did forget i have a gallery furniture football. seriously, they're going all the way this year.

let us down easy

on sunday, i rode 40 miles in the space race. the race was not held in space, blatant false advertising, but it was nice anyway. i wiped out about 10 miles before the end. i was taking this corner too fast and became fixated on this pebble/rock. i knew if i hit it, i was done. so i was trying to avoid it, but in the mean time i wasn't slowing down. so i tried to slow down at the last second and didn't get my hands there in time and just wiped out and landed on my left hip. it was easily the coolest thing that happened all day. my hip is a little bruised and i have some scrapes on my left leg, but it worth it.

the astros opened the season last night and lost to the cubs. i'm still sticking with a fourth place finish for this team. it's going to be a long year.

my one year anniversary is coming up next week, april 19th. can't believe it's already been one year. they say the first year of marriage is the toughest. or maybe it's the last year. but either way, the first year was difficult in some regards. marriage has to be a coming together of two people. if those two people try to remain too independent and never meet the other person in the middle, it won't work. you have to sacrifice some things. but it's easier if you're sacrificing things that makes the other person happy. and that's really the end result you want anyway. i've learned a lot about myself, some things good and some i'm not proud of and i'm determined to change. but i'm lucky that i have a partner who listens to me and actually tries to make herself and our marriage better and accepts me for who i am. she will not let us fail and i love her dearly for that. i'm very lucky. so here's to year number two coming up. i can't wait.

reckoner

i caught the last part of this last night. must see TV.

take 54

i just ate a whole bag of garlic pita chips. i'm convinced my breath will smell like garlic in the year 2016. it's intense man.

"i sang my balls off for you baby, i worked my fingers to the bone, i closed my eyes to get the high note, but when i woke up i was alone!"- take 54, harry nilsson

i love harry nilsson.

has anyone heard this joke: hey, did you hear? social security is broke! that's the joke. not really funny, but true.

ha. ha.

we finally watched the queen last night. i thought it was a great movie. it definately highlighted how much i do not understand the british monarchy. not because of their actions, or stoic nature towards life and the public in general, but their actual existence. i suppose it adds stability to the political landscape, but what does that stability actually afford? nothing in the way of state decisions or policy-making. the queen/king might be consulted or informed of agendas or party ideology, but at the end of the day, the queen/king cannot institute or enforce policy. i've, obviously, never lived under a monarchy, figurehead or otherwise, so my relationship to one is based on observance of others. we no longer believe the queen/king represents a chosen figure by God. their families are not ordaned by prophecy or memento to lead absolutely. they were the best at the consolidation of power. they used aggression and the wealth of their times to keep their power. nothing more, nothing less. and good for them. but to stand and ask me to bow to a woman/man of this earth and hold them in such high regard is ludicrous. the monarchy seems to me nothing more than a tourist attraction. it's a soap opera. and when all the lights are turned on, the british monarchy actually costs the citizens of britain about $40 million pounds. maybe more is taken in from tourists, but i cannot find those numbers. the bubble that exists for the life of the royals seems to have been punctured by the constant glare of their uselessness. i wonder if i will see the end of the british monarchy in my lifetime. it seems i probably will.

burning down the house

the market is way up today. it's also raining and i just ate something really weird tasting chicken. not from the chicken restaurant where the chicken wants to beat me up or i want to beat it up. not that one. just normal chicken. i made it. it's gross.

with the economic downturn comes horrible consequences for us all. but one consequence that actually benefitted us was lower gas prices. remember when gas was almost $4.00 a gallon? that's coming again soon, but here's some explanation on why that happened.

there are new rules being/about to be put in place regarding mark-to-market accounting. this is a big deal in the way that banks/financial institutions value their assets. here's what's happening.

i ran across an article listing the top ten ideas changing the world. normally i would read it and roll my eyes at the obviousness of the things on the list. this list, however, is quite intriguing.

there's a new cigarette tax in place. cigarettes are currently more expensive than toilet paper and diet soda. i'm sticking with the latter.

how tarnished is america in regards to the collapse of our economy? krugman has a nice article on the topic.

brian mctaggert, from the chronicle, and i have been going back and forth about the yankees. there is no way, no way, no way, the yankees are winning the world series. it ain't gonna happen.

back at the chicken shack

so there's this chicken on 290 and W. 34th street that stands outside this new chicken restaurant and tries to get customers who are driving by to stop and go to the chicken restaurant. this chicken is pretty tall, probably about my height and it kept doing this hand motion while i was sitting there, like a motion to move over and come and eat some chicken. then, the chicken looked right at me and made some weird motion with it's hand that was like telling me to eat it. i started laughing and shrugged my shoulders, saying, i don't know what you're saying, you're a chicken. but it did it again and walked away in a strange chicken walk. it was surreal. i kept picturing the chicken from family guy who fights peter. i thought about getting out of my car and fighting the chicken, but i don't know that i would be able to stop laughing enough to fight it.

unstructured finance says break up the banks.

did obama pull a "reagan?"

hussman funds discusses the urgency of abandoning the purchase of toxic assets.

rush limbaugh is casting a large shadow over the republican party. avoid the pun in the road.

war pigs- the cost of a global empire.

amazing shots from earth hour 2009.

avclub has 25 great albums best played start to finish.

spin the black circle

how was the weekend? mine was quick. and monday is starting off with a bang.

did anyone else ever get the feeling the last fifteen years that there was just too much? too much of everything? too much excess? too much indulgence? i didn't feel it when i was younger because i was more worried about getting laid. but after that, there was just always this lingering feeling of too much. i know this economic downturn is horrible for people out there. some people have lost their jobs and are having to make great sacrifices. i understand and i feel for them. but with every horrible event, there has to be something learned. and i think we as a country should learn something from the last fifteen years, which is, we don't need so much shit. our place in the world is not a given right, we have to work for it and yes, sometimes put off instant pleasures. our wallets got bigger, but so did our waistlines, so did our indulgences and with that self-restraint and patience was lost. and i read this article the other day and it's stuck with me: the end of excess. and while i think it's too early to call this thing, i hope we're learning about ourselves in the process.

krugman is now a celebrity economist. here he is on the cover of newsweek.

i preach the stylings of warren buffet on this blog. my man didn't have a good couple of years. the buffet way is under attack.

wow, just looked at the market: it's tanking.

GM ceo is out. and it's about time.

pets

we have a pet. his name is benjamin. he's very demanding. he likes to drink water out of the bathroom sink. he likes to be petted constantly, unless he's asleep, then he wants you to leave him alone. he also throws up quite a bit. this is kind of what he looks like. that's not him, but it's pretty damn close. and in spite of all these things, i really him. he lays on my stomach when i watch tv. and when he wants me to pet him, he'll start petting my face, usually around my chin. other times, he'll be walking and just plop down next to me. and other times, he'll do something out of the ordinary, like get up on the dining room table or answer the phone. he doesn't answer the phone, but i like to think he could.

here's a building that is alive.

tesla (not the band, or the man) has a new electric car.

i create lists all the time. i'm a list guy. one of my favorite lists is of the astros: best, worst. all that. so this guy has a list of recent (post-2000) draft flame-outs. check it out.

all my thoughts

i'm always amazed by what i'm thinking about when i'm driving. it's rarely about driving. it's usually about late nights in huntsville. or early mornings when i was a in high school. or outside fox sports at 4 in the morning. or mostly about where i think i'll be in five years/ten years. or about diet soda. it's usually one of those.

coconut records is so good. they're on the border of almost cloying annoyingness, but they walk that line so smoothly, that i love it. they're great. schwartzman is great. i have to thank tboyd on that one. that was his call.

anyway, good talking to you.

sunshine superman

this could be the coolest thing i've ever seen/read.

can we still be friends?

i'm having a change of heart on the new u2 album. not a total change of the heart, but i'm listening without my mind made up already. there seems to be two u2's on this album. that's a difficult sentence to type and think. the first two tracks are incredible. the title track and "magnificent" have this yearning, pushing feel to them, that they might be break apart or speed off into nothing. the next two tracks are pretty good. but then the change happens. all of a sudden we get languid melodies and fill-in-the-blank lyrics. then comes "get on your boots" which i still think is a terrible song. the album then tries to turn back into the first part again.

it's somewhat of a shame because it seems they had some serious ideas about where to go, but sacrificed just enough to water down the album.

rolling stone looks at 45 new albums coming out this spring. wilco and the avetts are there.

lucky old sun

i did the bike ride yesterday. i rode 60 miles. and today i feel great. except for being burned to a crisp on my arms and legs. i put sunscreen on my face because my nose always burns, but i neglected my arms and legs and i am paying for it today. i'm going to take an oatmeal bath tonight and soak out of the heat. this is intense. but the ride was great. i had a blast and i think i did pretty well considering how little i actually ride. it was seriously a tour of houston. i mean we went back and forth and saw the same area like two/three times. there's another ride coming up out at nasa that i think i might participate in also. i love bike-riding. plus the bike i used was pretty sweet. i was clocked around 20 mph, at some points a little faster. the wind man. i was like the wind.

all things to do with the bank bailout today. first, what the hell was TARP? we basically gave the banks $700 billion and now we have to buy their toxic assets for $1 trillion? what is going on here?

breakdown of the plan.

analysis from businessweek.

mish's take.

krugman's take.

frontline will air a program entitled "ten trillion and counting" this tuesday. check local listings for airtime.

here is a quick history of the federal reserve. check it out.