When you stick a pencil in a glass of water it appears to bend. (A story about the history of music in NEPA)

In the days before Wikipedia, a group of pseudo-intellectuals sat around discussing science fiction movies. An ashtray filled with four forgotten lit cigarettes sat on a table that sat in a back room of a diner that was located in an old city in a part of the country you probably have never been to. The conversation was strained because there was no quick way to tell the other that their f-in a$$ had fallen off due to uncontrollable laughter at a joke, most likely their own. In fact in these days there wasn't much laughing because everything didn't need to be funny. The ashtray confirms this as it began to wish that the owners of the cigarette would remember their habit. A song came on the radio. It was one of those songs that doesn't distract the players in this story from interupting their conversation. So it is safe to say this song was not performed by Smashmouth or Chumbawumba. A waitress came for their order.

What can I getcha?

-I'll have a glass of water and 3 pieces of toast, please. And one cup of coffee.

-Make that two coffees. And two waters. No toast for me.

-Coffee and uh, what kind of soup do you have?

Chicken noodle and italian wedding.

-Oh, forget the soup. I'll just have some coffee and a brownie. (This guy decides to wink at the waitress and the waitress ignores it completely).

-Can I order a Spanish omelete? And an orange juice and some Root Beer please?

Any side?

-Oh, maybe just some toast. Lightly toasted. If its burned I'll flip out.

Ok. Anything else? Oh I forgot you, honey.

-I'LL HAVE A BURGER, MEDIUM, AND A SIDE OF COLE SLAW PLEASE.

Everyone stopped what they were doing. All of a sudden everyone noticed that song that had been playing so quietly before.

Dan lied about liking death metal (aka Achievement)

Dan used to live in a prison cell. He didn't do anything bad, it's just that the prison ran out of money. It wasn't profitable to keep all the criminals locked up anymore, so the prison was forced to shut down. All the criminals went home to commit more phony crimes. Like siphoning gas from the neighbor's Hyundai and swearing loudly at the television while Jeopardy is on. Life is perfect, crimes don't exist. The closed prison was purchased by a crooked landlord and the cells were transformed into apartments. Dan rented one years back.

I visited Dan in that cell once. We had made plans to go see a concert and he suggested that I stop by his place before we went so we could drink a bunch of beers that he didn't need to smuggle into the prison, since it wasn't really a prison. I was hesitant, but I said ok. I showed up at his cell around 6 or 7. He was excited to have company because he just found out that a neighbor down the way hung (or is it hanged) himself (or is it thyself). This was a regular thing evidently and it was starting to depress Dan. I told him that it was a shame, but he shouldn't be too sad about it. We were going to a pretty great concert after all. I think it was an Oil Dragon concert. We loved that band. He quickly forgot the suicide and he started pounding Coors Originals. After about an hour I looked at my watch and realized that we would need to leave soon if we wanted to see the opening bands. I think the opening bands included The Transylmaniacs and The Invisible Gas Mask Theory, who we really wanted to see because we both heard great things. I said, "Dan, we got to leave NOW". He looked at his watch and nodded his head while opening another Coors Original. "We got time for one more beer". Police sirens weren't heard in the distance.

We never made it to the concert that night. Turns out Dan wasn't in the mood for going to see a couple of bands. After about another hour of drinking and talking about life I left. I went to a diner on the other side of town that sat on top of an abandoned cemetary. One day it stopped being profitable to bury the dead, so the cemetary was forced to sell land to developers. I ordered a grilled cheese with french fries and a chocolate milk shake. It was pretty good. Which is generally how I remember most things to be.

Birthday

Today is my birthday. Everybody gets pitchforks.

I am 30 today. I am ecstatic. Sarah got me a pretty great running watch. This will help with marathon training. Since getting rid of the gym membership, I have continued to run but I have no way of knowing how far I am actually running. I have a general idea because a solid year on a treadmill has given me a basic understanding of my pace, but it will be nice to not have to estimate. I have to figure out a way to calibrate the watch. Perhaps I will ask Lady Gaga.

Lady Gaga? Yes, Lady Gaga. She is making the marathon mix tape because it is hard not to relate to songs about boys eating your heart on a subway.

The songs from The Fame Monster that make the marathon mix tape:

Bad Romance (4:54)
Alejandro (4:34)...Not really that good of a song, but I like making fun of it.
Monster (4:09)


Oh, Maksim got me a great Philadelphia Union pin for my pin collection. This collection is kept on a Natty Light wrist band that is wrapped around my truck's stick shifter. Other pins so far include one for Richmond, VA and the Irish flag. Great collection if you ask me. It only costs $5 to view this exhibit.

He also got me a soccer referee book, so now I can give out proper yellow and red cards whenever needed. The homemade cards that I was using were bunk.

Beach House

Another CD that was purchased with borrowed money was Beach House's "Teen Dream". I heard them once or twice driving around in my truck on WXPN. I think that radio station had them as an artist of the month, one month. A mental note was made that if I ever get back into music, I would check out a cd. I was a little disappointed after the first listen, so I decided to leave the disc alone for a while. A day later, I am hooked. The whole album is perfect for my marathon mix tape. The music fits my running style perfectly (spacey and slow) so I am sure not to qualify for Boston if I listen to these songs on repeat. The band sounds My Bloody Valentine-y at times, while the vocals bring Nico to mind. pretty good combo. It's tough to separate the album into separate tracks for a mix tape, but I was able to eliminate a couple of songs. The team and a sub remaining:

Zebra: 4:48
Silver Soul: 4:58
Norway: 3:54
Walk in the Park: 5:22
Used to Be: 3:58
10 Mile Stereo: 5:03


The cd was cool because it came with two discs. One disc, wrapped in a blue zebra cd sleeve contained music, while the other, wrapped in a pink zebra cd sleeve contained a DVD.

marathon mix tape continued

Sarah and I threw a party for ourselves since we both turn 30 in July. Unexpectedly, people brought gifts. Among these gifts was a Best Buy gift card from Shaun (sp?) and Lisa (sp?) for a billion dollars (sp?) (they also got me a super Jonas Bros. Helium Balloon which is super great (sp?))

With this gift card, some musical cds were purchased. I bought the Mumford & Sons CD, "Sigh No More", because I liked their performance on the Jimmy Fallon show. The cd is pretty good. I think it probably will get old fast, but I'll add three songs from it anyway. Mumford & Sons is on regular radio I believe and they sound punky w/ banjoes. Vocals sound like the Irish dude from Once, but not as whiney. That's my expert analysis. They don't have a drummer, but instead the main dude kicks a kick drum while guitarrin and singin. Now that they are bigger, they might want to hire a drummer. But I guess whatever works for you is also good.

Tracks added:

Sign No More (3:27)
The Cave (3:38)
Little Lion Man (4:07)


In other news, David Kahn just traded for Delonte West and Sebastian Telfair. This offseason, Kahn has signed or traded for Darko, Telfair/West, and Michael Beasely. Awful. Too bad I will be forced to watch this team because I want to follow Wes Johnson's pro career.

Knives and necks, the yes-hitter.

I didn't have that dream where I couldn't run after you. At the same time I didn't have the dream where I couldn't run away. I didn't have the dream where I couldn't yell out your name because my vocal chords were replaced with turkey wish bones in a back alley operation performed by amateur surgeons armed with nothing but salvation army knives and dental floss. A call for help in this dream resulted in a thousand dentists running. So I take this as a good sign that these dreams weren't dreamt. If I did have these dreams my own personal I had a dream speech would seem sort of depressing. An endless baseball game where your team's last remaining pitcher is the infamous hurler of the eternal yes-hitter. Instead, I would begin by saying that I had a dream but I only remember the ending, but that ending was real nice. The judge judged accordingly and everyone got to go home.

Gogol Bordello

Ryan made a good point about Nick Cave songs not really being good running songs. While they will stay on the mix tape, I decided to find something with more of a tempo. The next two songs will be from Gogol Bordello, the gimmicky Gypsy Punk band from Ukraine and NYC.

Tracks:

Wonderlust King (Time: 3:58)
American Wedding (Time: 3:38)

Both of these tracks are off the Super Taranta! album.
These tracks will hopefully come on during my kick.