The guest of honor

Two times in as many days they've told us that the Big One is coming, the snowstorm that's going to bury us. Hasn't quite worked out like that. Sunday night going into Monday we got snow mixed with rain, but the latter predominated so much that no snow was left over by Monday lunchtime. Today we've got some accumulation, but very shallow and basically only on patches of greass. Don't get me wrong, though. We've definitely crossed into some wintry patterns. Just not the way it's been cracked up to be.

In various nutshells

For all the cameras out there - public and private - it doesn't seem more people are really looking, really seeing what's around them than before. Probably not many fewer are either. It's just that there's an imbalance.

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This photographer, Lisa Kereszi, does seem to have it on the ball. Her compositions capture both beauty and decay - the latter in the natural sense, not necessarily the gothy ones. These pictures don't have a lot of people in them, but you can picture a human element.

Friday Random Ten going into Saturday

Yeah, this one is a hybrid as I was transcribing song titles onto paper on Friday but forgot to put them up on the blog until today.  Oh well.

It's the first FR10 of December and a couple of weeks after the time when I start leaving the water out.  That is, in the summer and the warmer parts of fall and spring, you can keep water in the fridge and it will be refreshing cold but not so cold it hurts to drink it, or at least not for long.  After a certain point in the year that process just takes too long, so you adjust.

1. Rasputina - Remnants of Percy Bass
2. Yo La Tengo - Point and Shoot
3. Morphine - In Spite of Me
4. They Might Be Giants - Dog Walker
5. Ladytron - Soft Power
6. New Pornographers - Silver Jenny Dollar
7. Sarah Vaughan - You Hit the Spot
8. Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band - Death Cab for Cutie
9. Gogol Bordello - Sally
10. Nellie McKay - The Downlow

Don't worry, not all posts will be like this

This is, you know, kind of obvious? Just about all of us have heard guys finishing declarative sentences with a high rising terminal? Even if it's more embarrassing for them than it is for girls? We're talking mostly younger men and teenage boys? But sometimes men in their forties and fifties too? So it's just kind of a stereotype we've projected onto the opposite sex?

Also? I've heard the Frank Zappa/Moon Unit Zappa song "Valley Girl"? There's hardly any uptalk in it? Maybe the headline is a little misleading?

Which way? This way!

Still not doing a really ambitious post, but what are you gonna do?

These kinetic sculptures by Lin Emery are quite something. They strike me as quite playful. Whether the process of making them was playful I don't know, but the movement of the objects appears as a kind of play.

Incidentally, this is the better of two videos I found with the same subject and similar images. The other was on Vimeo and its musical backing was... unfortunate

Now that's beat!

Oh dear.  I'm so tired, I can't think of anything funny to say.  Now would not be an ideal time to face a firing squad.

Enwreathed Saturday Random Ten

On my way out today I saw the building's housekeeper.  I met her before I moved in but our paths hadn't really crossed since then.  I let her know that I liked the Christmas wreath she put on the side door.  It is a nice touch.

1. The New Pornograohers - Sweet Talk, Sweet Talk
2. The Bird and the Bee - Love Letter to Japan
3. Jimmy Smith - But Beautiful
4. Joni Mitchell - Song for Sharon
5. Marvin Gaye - Right On
6. They Might Be Giants - When Will You Die
7. Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band - I'm Bored
8. Pink Martini - Je Ne T'aime Plus
9. Edith Piaf - J'm'en Fous Pas Mal
10. R.E.M. - Laughing