damn, i spent about 3 hours trying to figure out what was wrong with my soundcard because the input wasn’t reading on any of the wave recorders i used. i tried 5 different wave programs before i decided it was a problem with the actual card connection. after disconnecting my card opening up the box and trying something different a few more times, i gave up. sorry, brandon, i can’t upload the song i recorded, so there’s no way for me to get what i mixed down off the minidisc onto computer. you’ll have to wait. that goes for the rest of you.

whenever i get really tired and have been in front of the computer too long, my eyes tend to blur on the tops and sides, as if i’ve just woken up from a long sleep. i should really actually be sleeping right now, but i’m figuring if i get this done now, the post will be up all sooner in the day and i won’t have to rush before i go to work.

since i should be asleep, i tried to choose relatively quiet songs that i could fall asleep to, incidentally, everyone everything listed here is just a name. don’t fall asleep at work.

dammit, i need to go to bed.

ADDENDUM: so i wake up, and catchdubs has this link, so i say what the hell, the recording can’t sound any worse than it already is, and i’m curious as to how audioblogger sounds. the combination of a bad connection on my cell phone, too much volume (be sure to turn your volume down otherwise you might get blown out of the water), and not wanting to mess around with it too much all leads to a one-minute audio of that song i recorded that is terrible. absolutely horrible. but i post it anyway. can you feel the love?

“This is not a joke?”

cool, a friend of mine, eli’s got the feature article in this week’s stranger! good read, and i’m not just sayin’.

i’d be interested in going to see this, but if they didn’t want it to be a mockery, they probably shoudn’t have called it a theme park

hahaha, dude, i almost peed my pants reading the title of this sequel!: 2 Fast 2 Furious

i don’t think garfield has been funny in a long time, really, was it ever? i don’t remember ever laughing at it, but i do remember reading it every sunday, along with other greats such as blondie and calvin & hobbes. i did always skip cathy and prince valiant, too. thankfully, neither of them is getting their own cgi movie. if we’re lucky, garfield will be shiny and high-gloss, just like all the cool spaceships on episode II.

speaking of star wars, there is actually good news in the the lucasfilm department– star wars shorts are to be produced by genndy tartakovsky. they’re going to air them on cartoon network, and by the speed of cn’s growth, i’ll predict that adult swim type programming will have its own channel by next year. be sure to check that link– new cartoons by craig mccracken (powerpuff girls) and the addition of family guy to adult swim.

Riding a circus elephant.
Peter Griffin: Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change.

i just finished you shall know our velocity five minutes ago. i’d forgotten i knew the end already by the time i got there, even though you see it everytime you pick up the book– it’s printed right on the cover.

i read slowly, though i went through this book as fast as i did eggers’s first, and enjoyed it as much, or from what i can remember. it’s been a long time since i read that one. i tend to ingest a lot from books as i read them, especially those in the same boat as this one, with thought after thought printed in the pages, and everytime i read, i always tend to think about something else at the same time. it’s odd, really.

what i really mean to say is that february is over and i’m done with my second book. a book a month i said, at least i haven’t failed at everything.

—

the wind is blowing hard here right now. i hear it knocking on the door and sometimes feel like someone’s waiting to come in. my baseball bat is downstairs. there’s a bottle on the table, i’ll break it on the table and use it to stab the intruder. i can survive like this.

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do you realize how many times i write a sentence and then erase it? how many conversations do you think i’ve stifled? i’m a dam, and you’re waiting for the flood gates to open.

i know, i know, i’m a couple weeks late on this one, and i’m not even listening to it in my car anymore, but this album is one of the few albums i’ve listened to in a while that i could listen to all the way through. tracks 2-6 are gold, the rest take a little growing.

like i said before, it’s rock with integrity and intelligence. there’s some major investment by the artists in this record. if you’re serious about music, you better recognize it.

ADDENDUM: here, poke fun, but i’m not the only one. and i am no up-and-coming journalist.

all right, i admit it. i’m damn excited about baseball season. i like to read about spring training and randy winn adjusting becoming the mariner’s new left fielder. i was disappointed that the exhibition game in peoria was rained out, and i really want to see if freddy garcia has the shit this season. all right, all right, i’ll even admit to this: i joined a fantasy baseball league.

i have to start figuring my picks, though i have to try pretty hard not to pick all mariners. i wonder if cameron’s season will be any better than last year? ahh, jeese. let the ridicule begin.

—

i did three or four takes of drums yesterday in the apartment, i worried i was making too much noise, but i don’t think anyone else was in the building. i used the 57 as an overhead and my condenser mic for my md player for the bass drum. i didn’t blow it out, but it sounds like i did on the recording. the drum track sounds pretty awful right now, as i haven’t played drums in a really long time and my kick drum is missing a head on it, so it sounds like crap, too.

as if i haven’t spent enough money in the past few weeks already, i checked out some decent bass drum mics and found a bunch of people mentioning one-trick-ponies like the d112, but i did find a tutorial on how to make a mic (specifically for kick drums) from headphones using the speaker driver.

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ps. sorry for yesterday’s post. you can probably tell i was reaching for something to write about, and i give you drivel about new jersey and hamburgers.

i’ve got a vivid memory of the new jersey shoreline shortly after september 11th. it was frigid that day, and raining all the way up and down the eastern coast, and we drove in from the south. at a certain point, we decided to head straight towards the water, and by the time we got there, it was late in the afternoon.

the sky was slate gray and the beaches were empty. the wood was dotted with raindrops and broken and creaky planks, the beach was combed over by the wind. the waves pounced onto the shore and danced in the distance with white caps moving slowly from side to side.

i walked towards pier buildings, marked with signs for pier food decorated in their bright colors, rain pelting my head and dripping down into my eyes and into my coat. i want to go back, and feel water tugging at my coat. i want to be cold and to see my breath. i want to drive up the new jersey turnpike in torrents, and eat at the burger king at the rest stop on our way to ithaca. an overpriced mediocre burger never tasted so good.