#37 - the go-go's were soooo right.

oh man, i am soooo on vacation right now & when i say vacation, i actually mean a non-travel extended period away from the job & the office & its accompanying work & stresses. other than a few stints of unemployment here & there, it's my first vacation since at least 2005, so i've been making a big deal out of it, bringing it up in conversations & emails, referring to it in my facebook status, blogging about it, essentially casting a full net of 21st-century communication designed to ensure that everyone & their mother is aware that i am on vacation.

i suppose the reason i'm so actively promoting this fact is that i've been at my current job for almost two years now & actually still love it & it's our first time apart. in the past, my jobs have been like my relationships--they usually last somewhere between a year-and-a-half to two years & start to go downhill months before they actually end...i get bored...i need change...cuts must be made...& then one day, it's game over.

despite my length of service at this job, i still like it after just short of two years together. during my time there, i've worked my ass off, skipped lunch break after lunch break to get work done, spent hour upon hour working from home & to the enjoyment of the co-workers in my immediate area, have probably done an inordinate amount of audible huffing & sighing at my desk whilst doing so. i still like it regardless of my breathing anomalies.

the fact that it's a music industry job definitely contributes to my satisfaction, since music rules & all. just like before, in all the other industries i've worked in--college athletics, cable tv, fashion retail & newspapers--i went into the job not knowing all that much about the music industry & like with past jobs, i've developed a broad picture of the industry beyond the immediate knowledge i need to do my job. i love learning about how industries work & enjoy having a more-than-working knowledge of how their pieces fit into the grand puzzle. this is why jobs that require unique skill sets & knowledge--electricians, welders, chemists, drug dealers--make me want to be them...to see how they really fit in to the machine.

but for now, i'm on vacation.

#37 - the go-go's were soooo right.

snack: health valley mini chocolate chip cookies
drink: xs blast rootbeer blast energy drink

here is the first good thing about health valley mini chocolate chip cookies: they are tiny & conducive to popping into your mouth one after another after another while your vacation time fritters & wastes away. this is made even more pleasanter by the fact that they have no trans fats. zero. for the laymen, this means that a male human can consume infinite amounts of them with zero consequences to the body. zero. scientists have proven this. female humans are not allowed to eat cookies regardless of their healthful properties. got to think about that figure, gals!

here is the second good thing about health valley mini chocolate chip cookies: they are 70% organic & contain nary a drop of genetically engineered ingredients. this is in stark contrast to the snacks i usually eat--snacks that more often than not probably have some % of post-consumer recycled content amongst the ingredients.

here is the third good thing about health valley mini chocolate chip cookies: they are made in melville, ny, which is a town named after the guy who killed moby dick.

i don't know. i've downed a can of this xs blast rootbeer blast energy drink & i'm not feeling all that more energetic. i guess i feel a little more jittery than usual & a few of my fingers feel a tad more numb than usual, but that could be something else other than the energy drink. regardless, i like the flavor. it's not as chalky or tooth-coating as your average energy drink & it does taste like drinking a root beer dum dum. that's a definite plus. time to update your website, dum dums! the election (& your gimmick) are so passe (like heroin)!

please note that the snack & drink consumed it this blog do tie into a larger theme, but please don't kill yourself trying to figure it out. it'll be my little secret, like ryan seacrest's homosexuality.

#36 - four more years.

i don't know if you guys have heard about this yet, but there's a presidential election in three days. i tell you what...i am so ready for this election season to be over. tonight mccain is on snl. it's really wearing on me. i used to have tolerance for all the excess negativity baggage that comes with an election season. for the most part, i've held off on discussing the election here, so i'm going to go on for a while in this entry...you've been warned...

as a younger, pluckier man (of 22, 26 & 30...my bday was two weeks too late for the 1992 election) i only voted in one of three presidential elections, in 2004, believing that in 1996 & 2000, i didn't need to vote because the presidential election was easily going solidly democrat in massachusetts, where i lived at the time. local elections & issues? yeah, for some reason i didn't think about those.

i first registered with the green party & when i got to the polls on election night in 2004, i discovered that there was no green candidate on the ny ballot. i'd just sort of assumed that david cobb would be on the ballot, but nope...as a result, nader got my vote & when i had to go to the dmv to get a new license after being mugged the following february, i changed my party affiliation to independent...or so i thought. as i discovered when i went to renew my license earlier this year, i had actually chosen to become a member of the independence party. oops. now i'm an independent.

this election season, the degree to which people believe the following things astounds me:

- that barack obama is a muslim because his father came from kenya & his middle name is hussein. kenya is 78% christian, according to the c.i.a.. although the name hussein has prominence in shiite faith, barack shared the middle name with his father, who was an atheist. obama belongs to a church, for christ's sake! i'm a confirmed catholic & i don't even belong to a church. my middle name is richard...does this make me a crook? don't even get me started on the idea that barack obama isn't a u.s. citizen. i'm sure plenty of army brats have ties to just as many countries as obama & that doesn't make them less of a u.s. citizen.

- that this matters. muslim ≠ terrorist, folks. all religions have their terrorists.

- that acorn is intentionally registering "illegal voters." acorn's role is to try to get as many people to the polls as possible. is it their fault if a member of acorn, driven by voter registration goals, registers a potential voter & that potential voter has already been approached by someone else on the street a few weeks earlier & they decide to register a second time just to make sure they're actually registered? from what i've heard in reports, these registrations are often sent in flagged by acorn as potential invalid registrations anyhow.

- that this matters. unless any of these people go to the polls twice & vote, risking a $10K fine and five years in prison, it has no effect on the outcome of the election...zero.

- no hillary clinton = sarah palin. i mean, really, ladies? are you serious? i think hillary clinton is up there among the most skilled politicians of recent time, but sarah palin? is this really the woman you want to represent america as the first female elected to the white house? you would give up your right to choose to support her? i can think of 1,000 women who, from a feminist perspective, i would want to hold that distinction before sarah palin...i'd even put her behind maria shriver. at least maria has experience as a journalist, is married to a republican governor of one of the world's top ten-largest economies & is a kennedy.

- that barack obama = socialism. barack obama's definitely an advocate of spreading the wealth through social programs, in an effort to make more people's lives better. that's just his style of politics. some people don't want government to have that role. that's cool, although it's baffling to me that there are people who are christians who won't vote for obama. last i checked, doing whatever possible to benefit the greater good (i.e. spreading the wealth to ensure people have food, shelter, education, a better life, etc.) was part of jesus's teachings, but i haven't been to church in a while, so that may have changed.

- that sarah palin ≠ socialism. last i checked, one of her claims to fame was that as governor of alaska, she helped get every alaskan citizen an additional $1200 rebate, spreading the wealth from oil profits. i may have got a c in my college economics class, but that sounds somewhat like socialism to me.

on the flip side, i'm sure there are accusations that are being made by the obama camp about mccain/palin that are way off-base (hey, remember joe biden? what ever happened to that guy?), but since i'm more liberal leaning, i haven't paid attention to those as much & therefore can't speak to them. either way, when i go to the polls on tuesday, neither mccain or obama will get my vote. in fact, i'm probably going green...that way, i'm supporting a candidate who's both black & female, which makes me totally progressive & revolutionary. luckily, the green party is actually on the ny ballot this year.

i will say this about the 2008 presidential election--it's gotten people amp'd about politics again. that'll come in real handy if mccain happens to steal the election & folks across the country decide to riot. if that does happen, let's keep that energy up, people! democracy rules!

#36 - four more years.

snack: pizza bagels
drink: dogfish head 90 minute i.p.a.

snack time tonight is a pair of pizza bagels, made with thomas' whole wheat bagels, some francesco rinaldi mushroom, pepper & onion sauce and borden six-cheese italian blend. that means mozzarella, provolone, asiago, parmesan, romano & fontina cheeses! i don't even know what fontina is! how exotic of me, right?

i've had many a pizza bagel in my time. they were an easy pop-it-in-the-toaster oven snack back in high school & college & have been for most of the second half of my life save a brief five-year-or-so hiatus that ended a few months back. english muffin substitutions are always acceptable for this snack. recently, i have this thing where the pizza bagel can not cross my lips without a pound of crushed red pepper sprinkled on top. it tastes like burning.

my beer accompaniment, the dogfish head 90 minute i.p.a., was voted the winner of the realbeer.com "battle of the beers" contest three years in a row, from 2003-2005. i can't tell if they even give out this award any more. for all i know, dogfish probably broke it or something. i guess that's what happens when you let someone win three times in a row. regardless, the people voted (via the internet) for their favorite beer & their voice was heard, loud & clear. but seriously, the beer is really good...& the descriptions of the beers on the website have me wicked excited & i'm now obsessed with the idea that i need to go to rehobeth beach, delaware to the brewery ASAP. anyone up for a road trip? under an obama presidency, gas prices will magically drop even more & we'll actually be able to afford it, due to pagan islamic magic! yay, magic!

#35 - weenie howla.

i was at the local better-than-average for my area grocery store earlier this evening purchasing a lil' snack & couple of frosty beverages for a night of chillin' at my apartment. when i got to the beer section there were two girls from the neighborhood there, picking out a six-pack for the night. i grabbed my beers & snack & got behind them in line at the register. the guy behind the counter, who was probably in his mid-to-late twenties, was flirting with the girls, offering them halloween candy from the festive pale white bucket at the end of the register.

they left with a goodbye & as soon as they were on the other side of the sliding doors, he turned to me, smiled & said, "man, there are tons of hotties out tonight," to which i replied, "i bet the candy helps, huh?" the sad thing is that both of our statements are true.

for me, this scenario illustrates that which, as an adult with no kids, makes me both hate & love halloween. on halloween, adults do & get away with the stupidest of things.

females: a majority of the women (at least in nyc) dress up in the sluttiest outfits possible. as long as you are wearing a normally inappropriate amount of makeup & all black & you slap on a pair of cat ears/devil horns, you have a costume...but why stop there? there are a wide range of sexy costumes that you can wear, from a sexy cave woman to a sexy nurse to a sexy cop to a sexy sarah palin, which is basically a u.s. flag bikini with glasses & a ms alaska sash (hunting rifle not included). unfortunately, the costume's only available in up to size a 10, so sorry ladies who are over that size. apparently it's not possible for you to be sexy and/or the vice president.

males: this is your night to act like a jackass, especially to women, who will be flocking to you for the first time since sometime around last halloween because, well, girls love hugging and/or having their picture taken with chewbacca. if you're lucky, you might get to grab a boob or something. too bad your hoglike sweating inside the chewbacca suit has made you as moist as a gym towel...my halloween hero...the office's jim halpert, who in this week's episode, went as "dave."

i can't wait for the day to come when i might have a child of my own to take out trick or treating & subdue my hatred for halloween...& that'll be fine, because halloween is for kids.

#35 - weenie howla.

snack: cheddar beer flavor kettle chips
drink: southern tier brewing co harvest ale / brooklyn brewing co oktoberfest

you'd expect that since it's halloween, i'd be snacking on some sort of candy or treat, but nope...i decided to go with a bag of chips & a bag of chips that have the word "beer" in the flavor to boot--cheddar beer flavor kettle chips. they're pretty tasty overall. since they're kettle chips, they're nice & crunchy. the flavor's akin to cheddar flavored tato skins. you know the ones. the ones with baked potato appeal, cause they're made with potatoes & skins that are real. they're no longer made by keebler (who is now owned by the kellogg co) & are now made by the inventure group & also marketed as a t.g.i.friday's snack. i don't really taste the beer in these kettle chips, but that's okay, because i have two actual beers right here.

the first beer is from southern tier brewing co, out of lakewood, ny, which is about an hour & 45 min down route 90 from buffalo. it's an extra special bitter hoppy beer, but not too much so. enjoyable enough. the second is a brooklyn brewing co oktoberfest. there was a time when i was actually excited by brooklyn brewing co, but as happened with my former favorite local beers before brooklyn--harpoon & sam adams--i've drank so many of them over the years that they've lost their luster...seems like a theme, doesn't it?

in attempting to close, i'd like to draw a desperate parallel between my feelings toward brooklyn beers & what happened with me & halloween...they've both lost their luster. end transmission.

#34 - you ruined it.

i used to love magazines...grew up on them & junk. i read highlights, boy's life, yankees magazine (go sox), sports illustrated, a bunch of wrestling mags, spin, rolling stone (who changed size last issue...weird?), guitar world & whole bunch of other mags that fueled my sport & music obsessions. many of them are still in boxes in the attic of my parents' house, likely drying up from the heat or becoming nests for crafty nh chipmunks.

my all time favorite magazine = punk planet. a friend introduced me to it back in the summer of 2003, when i was on the cusp of thirtydom & the magazine was already on its 56th issue & had totally un-punk binding. every other month, when i thought there might be a new issue out, i'd head into the city like a twelve-year old & drop into kim's or universal news, hoping to find a new issue on the stand. 90% of the time, if there was a new issue out, i'd buy it & take it to a bench somewhere in the city to just sit out, flipping through it, skipping to the back to check out the d.i.y. files & countless album reviews, taking in an article here or there. i bought every single copy from that point until their demise in 2007, a demise that was mostly due to the usual suspects in the demises of independent publishers everywhere, notably lacking ad revenue/subscribers, the stuff that major mags are better positioned to deal with...so it turns out by making a bi-monthly event out of buying it on the newsstand, my non-subscriber ass partially contributed to the death of punk planet.

since its death, i haven't had another mag i've cared about that much. it sort of ruined magazines for me...although i suppose vice magazine probably had something to do with tainting (pun totally intended) magazines for me...that rag.

now, earlier this evening, i stumbled across a blog with a post about portland, oregon based (didn't it used to be san fran?) bitch magazine having financial woes. like i said, i've been out of touch with magazines recently, but i love bitch. it's another mag that i've had newsstand fever over in the past. turns out that back about a month-and-a-half ago, they made a plea to their readers & supporters when the need arose to raise $40K by october 15th to stay alive. within three days, they'd raised $46K. that in itself gives me cause to believe that the independent magazine isn't completely dead yet...i just wish worthwhile publications didn't have to resort to bake sales to remain viable...but, hey if you happen to like the cookies bitch is baking, go here.

#34 - you ruined it.
snack: cherry jello
drink: water

who in his or her life has never had a jello shot? not me, i say. you you say? liar. everyone on the planet who is not allergic to jello has had a jello shot & even some of those jello-allergy-inflicted folks have had at least one or two shots out of peer pressure/a need to live life on the edge. it's a scientific fact. look it up, liar.

myself, i was in both college & a fraternity & as noted previously, love consuming connective tissue & love supporting planters/kraft/altria/philip morris, so i have consumed tubfuls of jello shots in my day. not in one sitting, of course...or out of an actual tub...at least that i can recall. in fact, i have consumed so many jello shots in my day that i sort of hate jello now. jello shots pretty much ruined jello for me. like, right now, i'm spooning a bowlful of this cherry jello into my mouth & my brain is all "are you sure there's no vodka in this? i swear i can taste the vodka."

& since it's officially past midnight, with my bowl of jello, i'm going with a tall glass of water...trying to cut back on drinking a liter's worth of mountain dew after midnight, especially whilst inhaling a bowlful of gelatinous sugar. anyway, this is water's second appearance on the blog, so let's hear it for water & let's hear it for its right hand man, the brita, without whom none of this would be possible. and while we're at it, let's hear it for the boy as well. seriously, let's give that boy a hand. you'd better, or kevin bacon will be forced to give you the noogie of your life.

#33 - cmj at 33.

the annual cmj music marathon returned to nyc this past week, with its thousands of music peeps & their badges & bands & occasional film/other art events taking over the city from tuesday to saturday.

my first cmj was back in 2005, when i was overseeing the advertising for ny press' music section & doing some writing for it as well. i had me a badge that allowed me entry to any venue in the city for any show. it was the year of clap your hands say yeah. remember them? for the shawn circa 05 curious, my blog ramblings about the 2005 cmj festival can be found here & my ny press ramblings can be found via here.

when cmj came back round the next year, i was no longer with ny press & badgeless. same deal in 2007. both years, i caught a show or two. this year, after being slightly anti-social & slightly broke & relatively concert-free for the past few months & after being inspired again about live music because of a couple of shows by the albertans in the weeks leading up to cmj, i decided to try making it to a few cmj events this year.

on tuesday night, i met up with a friend at the paste magazine party at the red bull space...gotta love indie rock shows sponsored like football stadiums. when i got to the door, i was asked for my name...a list. didn't know that, but talked my way in aided by the ny press sweatshirt i happened to be wearing. apparently, it made me look like press. missed gringo star but caught sets by wild light, cheeseburger and the vivian girls. turns out wild light is from nh. they were ok. through the years, i've seen cheeseburger more times than i can count, often at random parties & art galleries & crap & they're pretty much the same thing every time--bad-ass party rock riffs, a few tossed beers & guaranteed ass crack. the vivian girls were pretty much what i expected--quick, solid rock songs...probably better suited for a non-red bull inspired space. i will say one thing for paste magazine...they pull indie rock hotties.

on wednesday, i planned to head to gallery bar to see the stone throw records showcase, featuring arabian prince (yeah n.w.a.!), peanut butter wolf & madlib. before i even made it to the train to go to the show, i was warned of a three to four person deep line wrapping around the block. i'm way too old for that magnitude of a line. pass.

thursday night was a no-go due to other obligations.

on friday, i attended a shalloween party at the village lantern, on bleecker. everyone was so thin & had the most awesomest clothes & sunglasses! omg! it wasn't officially a cmj event, but i went there to see a concert by the missing teens, a band who i had heard much about but never seen live & whose live show is definitely interesting & whose songs are full of saucy lyrics.

on saturday afternoon, i was on tha intrawebz checking out the gothamist website. as part of cmj, gothamist had transformed the bell house (a sweet-looking venue that i had no idea existed although it's a mere 15 blocks north of my house near the gowanus canal) into "gothamist house." every day, they had 6-7 bands play from early in the afternoon to early in the evening, pretty much during the time i was doing things like working. i noticed that the saturday lineup included the forms, a band who had coincidentally been recommended to me by the sister of girlfriend of a friend a few days earlier, so i decided to make my way down there for their 6pm set. when i arrived at 6:05, the forms had either gone on early or decided not to play (boo), so i stuck around to watch the next performer, sharon van etten. she's your average singer songwriter type with some emotion most of the time (eh). she had to deal with a loud conversational girl at the bar stage left, so props for that. on the way out, i grabbed a schwag bag, all environmentally sound & donated by whole foods & containing a tin of embittermints.

so that was my 2008 cmj. on a totally unrelated note, i turn 34 in three weeks.

#33 - cmj at 33.
snack: sensible portions pizzetta italiano pita bites
drink: 4c white iced tea antioxidant blueberry flavor

so last night, i was pooped beyond belief from the week & stayed in my apartment for the most part, consuming everything that wasn't nailed down & watching the final episode of the first season of breaking bad (check out that link if you have a few moments & sound...oh & bryan cranston is so deserving of the emmy he won for best actor...sorry jon hamm). i finished off the rest of a box of sensible portions pizzetta italiano pita bites. they're pretty good with a weird & slightly pizzalike aftertaste & the box suggests putting cheese & cucumber slices & herbs & junk on them. whatever, rockefeller.

i also drank a ton of 4c white tea during the eve. as mentioned in my first ever blog entry, iced tea's been the beverage i've had the longest-standing relationship with & 4c's been the powdered iced tea of choice for a lot of it. in recent years, the powder flavors have branched out from the standard lemon fare to include flavors such as the white & red teas. i enjoy the white tea for the most part, although the sweetness can be a bit much at times. it also goes well with white wine. i've yet to try the red tea, as it goes for something like $7 a can. i'll get that some day, rockefeller.