Rudie Can't Fail

While I was fixing dinner tonight (chicken piccata), I wondered what it was like to be the first music critic or even industry exec to hear certain albums. How exciting, to hear a soon to be classic, before the opinions were out in the mainstream.

What got me thinking of this was listening to London Calling, by the Clash. This album came out in vinyl in 1979. They were probably recording it around this time, 30 years ago. Thirty years later, it listens like a greatest hits album. I bought it in 1981, when I was a sophomore in high school. Boy, did I think I was cool. I think it's cooler now.

Last April, I went to see for the umptillionth time, Elvis Costello. My Aim is True was groundbreaking and fantastic then, and now. It was recorded in 24 hours in 1976. The American Bicentennial. To be the exec to listen to that....Wow. How cool.

Imagine sitting down to Exile on Main Street before anyone else. Not for competition, but for pure listening, not knowing what was coming and hearing it in order, on vinyl. Some Rebel Yell, neat, and you've got a banner evening.

I am not stuck in the past, only listening to the music of my youth. But some of the albums that came out in my record buying heyday became the plat standard of rock and roll.

Talking Heads 77. Think what that album started. Without the Talking Heads alt music would've had to have waited for some other breakout. Thankfully it was the Heads. Psycho Killer on SNL. That's classic rock, classic TV and fresh as a daisy.

Anyway, Interesting to No One, is just that.

Jackass Made Easy.

There will be different opinions, but I'm sticking to this one:

If your candidate doesn't get the nomination, and you will not vote for the Democratic nominee, out of some misguided Purity Principle, then you are a jackass.

Any Democrat is better than any Republican. Republicans and their shills have kept the legacy of racism and sexism alive and well. This is their history and their present.

Some may change sides, although I don't agree, but for any Democrat not to vote for the "other" cuz their candidate is so super awesome will only lead to John McCain. He, and the whack-a-doos he associates himself with are psychos, intent on getting their way NO MATTER WHAT, no matter how.

If you stay home, out of purity or anger, and John McCain becomes president, then you are the 2008 version of a Ralph Nader voter.

Bird Crazy

Migration is hard on birds, but like the symbols used by hobos during the great depression, birds know, by my elaborate feeding station, that they can find a friend @ 6211.

As of Easter 2008, it's been about a year that I have been feeding in the backyard. I started while I was not employed (not to be confused with unemployed), as a little experiment in Inside the Beltway living. Is there any wildlife six miles from the Capitol?

I have seen from my kitchen window about 34 species of birds. I know there are many more that I am not spotting because I have trouble telling some of the little brown sparrow types apart.

Some highlights: And these are no fish tales.
Bald Eagle. I live a house back from a lake that has three Eagles on it. One day there was a big bird in my tree. He was BIG.

Red Shouldered Hawk: hanging out by the feeder, waiting. I always know his success rate by the flurry of feathers he leaves behind. Natural selection's a bitch.

Pileated woodpecker and two babies. The grownup was the size of a crow. The babies, learning how to eat suet. A real treat.

A pair of mallards. Not rare or exceptional, but they chose my lawn for their family. I felt lucky.

This Spring will bring new friends to my feeder and I am looking forward to seeing who stops by on the way to wherever.

Now, if I lived ON the lake I'd really have good luck.

And like I said in the title of this blog: Interesting to No One.

I wrote this two years ago.

I used to ride the Acela or the shuttle to NYC at least three times a month to my old job. Not enough to make me a regular or anything like that, but enough for me to know what to look for to pass the time.

My non-descript look and totally non-threatening way made it simple for me to eavesdrop on the mighty and check out their habits.

GOOPERS were always ruder that Dem's. It was a given. If any group feels entitled, it's the moneyed GOP. You could tell they were brought up with class and wealth envy, because they were always so mean and rude to people who were "lucky" enough to be in the service industry.

Although I am embarrassed by my old habits and will not post them, I made sure that when some GOP BigWig was being an ass, he'd (mostly) pay.

My old blog, the last post:

Acelablog

My vow to you: I will sit as close as I can to whomever I recognize on my DC/NYC commute. I will listen in on all conversations. I will interrupt, when possible. I will report back.

Saturday, April 01, 2006

Busy month. All the rest..

Ken Mehlman in New York? Last I heard there were no "real Americans" in New York. Maybe looking for more ways to milk 9/11.

It really got the GOOPERS goat that something so terrible didn't happen in the heartland. Then they could milk that cow to kingdom come. Oh, they're doing that anyway. (and mixing metaphors)

Impish Ken loves his ceasar salad, and doesn't like the little red peppers on top. Oh, how sad it would be for Impish Ken to have heartburn. He's a little man, almost boy like in his appearance. Short, oddly shaped and skinny. Must be all those ceasars.

Note to Ken: It isn't helping those internet rumors when you travel with a very young attractive male. What no Texas blondes good enough to ride with bottom feeder Ken?

When he departs the train I get off right in front of him, I pretend I am one of those walkers who leans and cuts people off by walking at a slight angle. He finally slows his pace, right before he would've ended up on the track. Tragic. I know how flat a penny can get when a train runs over it. How flat could a puffer GOOPER get?

Others in March:
Vernon Jordan. Looking kind of old. Was by far the most polite person to his driver at the Delta terminal in NYC. Although you could tell he'd rather be golfing with Bubba.

Same plane: Bob Sheiffer.
He and his producer were discussing David Carr's media column in the Times. It was about perky little Katie Couric taking his job. They laughed in a condescending, knowing way.

I told him that I never watched the news, but I heard he was doing a good job, by reading it on the blogs.

Bob Kerrey. Scary and skinny. I'm sorry, but Debra Winger? He had a nice middle seat on the Delta shuttle the other day. Was chitter-chatting with Dick Gephardt.

It was kind of sad when the lady in line next to me said to Gephardt "hello Senator." As if!

Gephardt's many blackberries were not in the off position during flight. It was hard to tell, by looking over his shoulder if he was reading old emails or receiving new ones.

The passenger next to me kept giving me the eyeball. If you don't want someone to read your email, then don't read it on the frickin' Delta shuttle. I felt like I needed a smoke after that flight. We all got to know each other real well.

It stopped raining.

Soon after I wrote that, it stopped raining and I forgot about my little blog project.

Now, seven months later, I am ready to start with: Interesting to No One.

The Summer of No Rain

For the entire summer, it has not rained. Nothing. Brown lawns, dead shrubs, desperate Robins are the norm.

It has rained the entire week of my beach vacation. And although others have worse stories of vacations in ruins, I, being a navel gazing blogger, think mine is the worst.

It is a race to the bottom.

Money saved, weekly, to spend on a ocean vacation, is wasted. There is a downside to choosing a vacation location that is "quiet"...there is nothing to do when the poring down rain starts on Sunday and has not stopped as of 1:14 Wednesday.

Yesterday's lunch was two Bloody Mary's and a slightly tipsy trip to the surf shop for a sweatshirt. Did I forget to mention, it is 15 degrees below normal, a chilly 60 degrees, in August.

Enough for now. I am going on a date with Captian Morgan.