March 22, 2007

MUSIC

Andrew Bird’s new album is out, and it’s wonderful. I could listen to “Fiery Crash” over and over and over. Oh wait I am listening to “Fiery Crash” over and over and over. Sorry, officemates!

The other song I can’t take off repeat is Regina Spektor’s “Fidelity”. Here, have a listen:

Lovely, isn’t it? It’s hard as hell to sing along to, though. It breaks my hear-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-arrrt . . . ow. I think I just pulled something.

WEB IRRITATIONS

1) I can’t properly express how grateful I am that the obnoxious Comcast ad—the one with the severed ear that scurried around enticing you to, in my case, drop Comcast immediately and sign up with Qwest—on the blogs partnered with Federated Media seems to have completed its run. No fault of the bloggers, but jesus I hated that animated ear. Did you notice how it chased your cursor, without even providing a weapon with which to stab it repeatedly? Gah. Congratulations, Comcast, on coming up with a web advertisement even more annoying than those blinking WINNER! banners from 2003.

2) People need to stop setting their links to open in new windows. SERIOUSLY. Yes, I can tell my browser to open them in tabs so it’s marginally less sucktacular, but for the love of god, knock it off.

3) While I’m being all curmudgeonly and nitpicky and like Andy Fucking Rooney over here, can someone explain the purpose of the “jump” in a blog post, where you must clickety the little “continue reading” link to get to the remainder of the post? Why must I make with the clickety? My mousing hand, it is tired.

BABY TALK

Lately Riley is obsessed with trying to jump. He gives it the old college try by heaving upward and flinging his hands in the air, but his feet don’t actually leave the ground. Then he comes over to one of us and holds up his hands in the classic Pick Me Up Now Goddammit position and makes little whiny “eh, eh, eh” noises until we grab his arms and help him pogo up and down. This is fun until we decide we’d like to do something else, at which time Riley has a giant flaming meltdown complete with choking sobs and dramatic wall-poundings.

This five-minute cycle of pure joy to abject misery is the perfect little microcosm of parenting. Everything is unbelievably wonderful! Everything is kind of boring. Everything sucks, sucks, sucks, all to hell! Repeat.

THE UNDEAD ARE EVERYWHERE

I’m sorry to be bringing up zombies yet again, but there is something weird going on. The other day I was talking about zombies with JB, then we started watching American Idol and the chubby guy was singing a song by . . . The Zombies. Then? Then? A Diet Coke commercial came on, and it featured, wait for it . . . zombies. And then I found out about this musical (thanks, Christine) and I stumbled onto this t-shirt and at lunch today I bit into a piece of deli roast beef and for just a moment it dangled from my mouth, all fleshy-like, and I don’t know, man, I think the universe is trying to tell me something.

AND NOW AN IMPORTANT QUESTION

Tomorrow is “Parent’s Night” at Riley’s daycare so JB and I are going to try and see a movie. Both 300 and Zodiac look good to me—can you weigh in on this? Whichever one we don’t see will have to wait until it comes out on DVD, so I feel we must choose wisely.

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Melanie
Melanie
17 years ago

On Jumping: Don’t rush it! My Elizabeth is 18 months and has been jumping for a little while now. She learned how in her crib. In her crib, with the help of her mattress, she can get some serious air. She is usually holding the rail and I am so afraid she is just going to fall forward and knock out her teeny teeth. It is her favorite thing to do. Sometimes when she is playing in her room, she wants me to put her in her crib. It is like a trampoline to her.

Amy
Amy
17 years ago

Go see 300. It is an interesting story, although it is very violent, but so beautifully shot that you kind of overlook the gore. There is also a steamy scene, which….woah.

Oh…and lots of….um…..visions for the ladies, if you know what I mean. Can you say, “Abs”?

katie
17 years ago

i say see zodiac. it was so deliciously creepy. jake gyllenhaal…hott. mark ruffalo…great. robert downey–awesome. good dialogue. shocking violence. and i love that it’s based on a true story, being hte nonfiction geek that i am.
if you don’t have regina’s two albums, i would be more than happy to burn them (and a few other treats) and send them to you. let me know. and andrew birds a minnesota musician. so hooray for touting him from the land of the frozen—thanks on behalf of all minnesotans who care about their music.

Lacey Noel
17 years ago

300 is a two hour long orgasm. See it. Now.

sciencegeek
sciencegeek
17 years ago

My friends are responsible for the Philadelphia Zombie Crawl, a pub crawl which takes place on Easter Sunday. Instead of hunting Easter eggs or having Easter dinner with their families, they’ll be staggering down the street in full zombie garb.

I apologize for the flyer on the webpage linked below which I think is over the top. Not my idea.

Philly Zombie Crawl

My boyfriend will be dressed as zombie Ronald McDonald. I think I’m going to hit the goodwill and get some bad 1980’s businesswoman garb.

Caitlin
Caitlin
17 years ago

I saw 300 and liked it for the eye-candy and spectacle factor (though nowhere near as much as Sin City), but it was a little too…well…here, sex columnist Dan Savage gave it a way sassier review than I could muster:

http://www.citypages.com/databank/28/1372/article15257.asp

(Scroll down to the end of the column for the review)

veralynn
17 years ago

We went to see 300 this week. We both really disliked it. Vile dialogue, terrible script. The visuals, which were supposed to be so uber-cool, were cheesyfakey and all but one scene was done in a soundstage. It is, however, one that if you’re gonna see it, it might as well be on the big screen for all the rippley muscle, bouncing nipple action. Just sit somewhere off to yourselves because you both will absolutely be compelled to turn it into a MST3K episode full of snarky comebacks. That alone could make a fun date night out of a crap flick. ;-)

Zodiac: Overall, I quite liked it. Yup, there was a slow 30-40 mins, but really good acting, writing, directing and I found the story interesting.

Gillian
17 years ago

DO NOT SEE ZODIAC. Three hours with NO conclusion and too much backstory that resolves NOTHING. DO NOT! GO! SEE ZODIAC!

Gillian
17 years ago

AND IT’S THREE HOURS LONG! ARRGGG!

squandra
squandra
17 years ago

If you like “Fidelity,” you may very well love the video. The first time I saw it I watched it over and over and cried. Which … well, let’s just call that “out of character.”

You can watch it on YouTube.

(No new window there, just for you.)

Jehsika
Jehsika
17 years ago

I saw 300 yesterday. I got a 4:10 with the entire theater all to myself and it was unbe-fucking-lievable. Did you like Sin City? You will love this movie. I’d see it again today if I had the time.

Jehsika
Jehsika
17 years ago

um..also, it was based on Frank Miller’s graphic novel. It’s a graphic novel, who expects that to be true-to-history? It’s just supposed to be fun. Miller is the fellow who also wrote Sin City. Also, you will probably get to see the trailer for Grindhouse, the Tarentino movie…girl with what looks like an automatic cannon for a leg…I have to see that.

Nick
17 years ago

DUDE! The new Andrew Bird is freaking, bloody brilliant! Fiery Crash, Plasticities, Heretics, Scythian Empires…arrggggh my head will explode with the awesomeness. Everyone should totally check it out, its a beautiful 48 minutes.

If you haven’t heard the new Low album it is quite amazing too!

Quiana
17 years ago

See 300 in the theater. It is a theater movie. Zodiac is good, but would be just as good on a tv.
On the zombie topic- you should go rent Dead and Breakfast. Hilarious!

Lisa S.
17 years ago

I occasionally use the jump cut on long weblog posts, because otherwise my logorrhea would push other posts too far down the page and present readers with a big wall o’rant. I actually thought I was being user-friendly!

In other news, you’re an enabler, Sundry! Off to iTunes I went and I am now listening to all sorts of new tracks.

Alice
Alice
17 years ago

DEFINITELY go see 300 in a movie theater. it’s not a movie to think about and analyze, but it IS a movie to enjoy and be thoughtlessly entertained by. i am tempted to tell all the folks who hate it because it’s gay and historically innacurate to chill out and also maybe only see biographies and documentaries from here on out. if you are interested in seeing it, though, the big screen is that way to go. we’re trying to find an imax theater around here that’s showing it.

am IN LOVE with regina spektor, and especially that song, which i.. um.. maybe often listen to on repeat. a lot. for like the past 3 months. her voice gives me goosebumps.

ulli
17 years ago

Zodiac wasn’t that great. Haven’t seen the other one.

Colleen
17 years ago

I just had to say I agree with everyone of your “web irritations”.

And also… maybe Zoe can be Riley’s jumping buddy. She is starting to get a couple centimeters off the ground after hours of attempts!

Trena
17 years ago

okay I may be totally wrong here (it has been known to happen before) but I believe the whole ‘link opening in a new page’ is supposed to be a good thing that is the new standard with regard to accessibility for disabled people on the computer–(straining brain to remember) erm, in fact if you are designing a page, you’re *supposed* to make your links open in a new page for it to be good code.

Now shuffling back to my geeky corner.

Tara
Tara
17 years ago

Haven’t seen either movie, but one of my coworkers recommends 300. It begs for the big screen. And a very-buff Gerard Butler? Mmmmm, yummy. (but don’t tell JB, as that is not likely to be a selling point for him)

I HATE the jump thing, and am disappointed that some of my favorite bloggers recently started using it. If you make me work to read your stuff, I may just decide it’s not worth the hassle. I know it’s just a click, but damn.

Sarah
17 years ago

See 300 because I hear it is beauteous on La Bigass Screen. Jon saw Zodiak by himself (it was the weekend before finals and besiides, movies like that are too scary for me) and he said that it was not only NOT scary, but VERY VERY SLOW. He said it could have been cut down by about 20 minutes or so, especially at the end.

Have fun!

Rumblelizard
Rumblelizard
17 years ago

I don’t know if I’ve already posted this here, but you MUST see these: Dawn of the Knitted Dead http://electricbiscuitonline.blogspot.com/2005/10/dawn-of-knitted-dead.html and Shaun of the Knitted Dead http://electricbiscuitonline.blogspot.com/2005/11/shaun-of-knitted-dead.html Last but not least Day of the Knitted Dead http://www.flickr.com/photos/electricbiscuit/tags/dayofthedead/show/

Jessie
17 years ago

It may be too late for my input, but we watched 300 the other day and I’d totally recommend seeing it on the big screen.

Anais
Anais
17 years ago

300. Best. Movie. Ever>

Melanie
17 years ago

I’m guilty of the new window thing, because Firefox opens them automatically in tabs for me and I like it like that. And the zombie tshirt is awesome. And I vote for 300, because Jim Carrey not being funny is always so weird.

Melanie
17 years ago

Oh, and the Andrew Bird!!! I’ve had it on constant play since January and haven’t gotten sick of it yet. (Yes, we had a sort of leaked pre-release copy because we’re bad like that….) The Shins new album is my other huge musical obsession right now, too. I haven’t listened to Regina Spektor but always mean to and will have to later when I get to speakers.

Jane
17 years ago

I kinda like links opening in new windows, simply because then I don’t lose my place wherever I am on the original page. All too often I get carried away when I click the link, I end up somewhere else entirely, and then I have to click back back back back back a million times to get to where I was in the first place. Unless I’m missing something?

trackback

[…] Ever since I read this, I have been in a tailspin. Wait, people don’t like links to open in new windows? But what if they lose their place at the previous blog? Do you have any idea how LONG my average post is? Yes, yes, I know, Firefox holds your place for you, but believe it or not, some people do not use Firefox. […]

Rebecca M.
Rebecca M.
17 years ago

I can’t comment on the movies (and I’m late commenting on this entry, period) but I can tell you the the Evil Dead musical is AWESOME. I was lucky enough to see it in New York last November and I still get the songs stuck in my head occasionally.

And if you sit anywhere in the first two rows, you inevitably get splattered with stage blood, which just makes it all the more enjoyable as far as I’m concerned.

Jess
Jess
17 years ago

Thank you, thank you for the music recommendations! I downloaded the Andrew Bird album, and the Regina Spektor song to my ipod and have been a happy camper this weekend.

:)

jac
jac
17 years ago

Get the Tab Mix Plus extension on Firefox — one of the very first menu options is “Open links with a target attribute in current tab” and that gets a great big radio button TICK from me. Then I can middle-click them to open in the background if I want, or normal-click them to open them in the window I’m in. How do you people search eBay otherwise?

Speaking of spending money: Sundry, if you and/or JB are not sporting these shirts by Easter I will be dreadfully, dreadfully disappointed.

http://www.seibei.com/shop/intramural.html

You can customise VARIABLE LEVELS OF GORE. Don’t tell me you’re not smitten.

Rachel
Rachel
17 years ago

I’m late getting in here, my time has been consumed by watching mares foal (www.marestare.com) and i’m just getting caught up. (Do not, i repeat, do NOT go to that website. I’ve been ADDICTED!)

But, since you brought it up, may I add one of my “web irritations”?

Music and/or talking on the website? I’m not talking about a video or something i can click a little arrow to listen to if i so choose. I’m talking about music and/or talking that starts even before the website is fully loaded.

#A, it always, always, ALWAYS scares the bejeebers out of me, which in turn, PISSES ME RIGHT THE HELL OFF

#2, i may or may not be checking the particular website at work and did you ever stop to THINK? I may not want to broadcast to the entire workplace that i’m CHECKING OUT A WEBSITE???? (And don’t tell me to must the sound. did you also ever stop to think that i might need to sound on OTHERWISE? for ME? and not YOU?)

So, if you want me to visit your website, PLEASE, for the love God! DON’T have music embedded in it! Cause the second i open a website with music, no matter HOW badly I want to view it, if the music and/or talking starts up? I immediately close it.

um, yeah. apparently, i feel pretty strongly about this issue. Sorry for the all caps back there. crawling back under my rock now… thanks.

trackback

[…] #1 Regina Spektor’s Begin To Hope. First off, she’s Russian, which has that certain Slavic cachet, I think. Russian, and as you can see here and here, hot and the wearer of some very cute clothes. Can we just talk about the cut-out elbows in the second video’s suit? Because I think they’re just awesome, somehow. They remind me of something Linda Loudermilk would design, and I’m strangely obsessed with her clothes. But, um, I suppose her music isn’t about her clothes or her cute hair or any of that. So, the album. This is not really my usual type of music, but I like her voice and some of the songs are totally catchy. Boyo and I sang “It breaks my hear-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-ar-arrrt“ for hours after listening to it in the car. But some songs are just too Tori Amos punk rock grrrl with fairy wings and a piano for me, because I hate Tori Amos. Also Dave Matthews, not that that has anything to do with anything except to show that I am kind of a musical weirdo, apparently. Ahem. So, there are four or five songs on the album that just rock my world and get in my head and I sing all day, and there is The Suit Without Elbows, and the hot Russian-ness, so I think all that combined gives a thumbs up to Begin To Hope. Because, really, isn’t that what you were waiting for before running out to the store (or clickety-clickety Amazoning) to purchase the album? […]