Thursday, September 28, 2006

made me laugh

So bizarre, haha made me laugh

Great site to catalog books and discover new ones

http://www.librarything.com/

Good Poems For Hard Times


Garrison Keillor compiled the poems in this book and writes a great introduction.

Tuesday, September 19, 2006

I made some really good cookies tonite

Do you want the recipe?

HOMEMADE OREOS

1 chocolate cake mix
2 TBS butter or shortening
1/3 c water
1/3 c chocolate chips

Mix this together until it forms a pasty dough.
Put 1/2" sized balls on greased cookie sheet and press down slightly.
Bake for about 6-8 mins at 325.

Cool. Frost with a buttercream frosting, making a sandwich. I kind of made up my own from a hybrid of a few:

3 c powdered sugar
6 TBS butter
3 TBS heavy cream
2 tsp vanilla

It's pretty dang delish. Try this if you want.

Thursday, September 14, 2006

Borat

Sunday, September 10, 2006

8 important lessons learned from 80's cartoons

A scanner Darkly by Charlie Kaufman

Some people know that Charlie Kaufman did a pass of A Scanner Darkly, but did you know you can download it from here:
A Scanner Darkly by Charlie Kaufman

Thursday, September 07, 2006

theater music

i've never been a fan of the theater. It seemed too showy or made to be a spectacle for me to enjoy listening to it. However, I have found myself lately really liking singers that have a sort of theatrical flare to them. Maybe it started when I watched Funny Girl. I loved Barbara Streisand's musical numbers--she was just a big amazingly talented voice. Unashamed, and very emotional. I haven't started listening to her albums yet, but i have been listening to Rufus Wainright, and love Fiona Apple's "It's not about Love" from the Amazing Machine album--not the Jon Brion produced one--the other one. Both these artists to me have a similar big voice, raw at times (espcially Rufus, who I have a secret crush on (sorry Jordy) solely by merit of his voice and lyrics and song writing diversity and ability), and the instrumentation reminiscient of the theater.

It turns out I want to quote the first line of "Foolish Love": I don't want to hold you, and feel so helpless. (long pause) I don't want to smell you, and lose my senses.

Listen to it. I love his entrance on that first note. Very bold.

I don't feel like going to concerts anymore or listening to local bands--it seems more a scene than anything. But when a big amazing voice combines with great lyrics and an emotional soul--that is what i would pay money for. I wish I could have seen Queen in their day, or Babs; and i would see Rufus Wainright, and maybe Fiona (less likely).

Please suggest any others that might fit the bill.

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

some websites

-obscure music

-a helpful site for when you want to visit a website but don't want to create an acount

-a DVD distribution company mostly docs about bands

-one day one item

-customize your own online radio stations

Monday, September 04, 2006

something foolish

this is something you can do when you're bored and don't have a good book, or you're sick of the book you're reading, or if you just want to try it:

hold one hand out in front of you, bend your fingers under so that all you see is the back of your hand and the one section of fingers closest to your knuckles. Then blur your eyes and wiggle your fingers slightly. Stare at them like this until it looks like that's all you have for fingers--little stubs.
jordan and i both used to do this independently of one another before we even knew each other. the other thing i used to do is stare at my toes until i could isolate the muscles and move one toe at a time.

Music

In my iTunes i've been sorting by the number of times a song has been played and listening from the most frequent on down. It's a cool way to do play lists.

The ten most frequent songs played on my iTunes are performed by (in the following order):

Radiohead
Jose Gonzalez
Sufjan Stevens
Bonnie "Prince" Billy
Neil Young
Amina
Bonnie "Prince" Billy
Jon Brion
Bonnie "Prince" Billy
Death Cab For Cutie

What are you guys listening to?

graphic novels


i've been into graphic novels a bit lately. it seems like there's some cool potential for the medium of sequential art. maybe i just like them because they're short and have pictures.

i've liked: "jar of fools" by Jason Lutes, maus and maus II by Art Spiegleman, Persepolis, Persepolis II (this one especially good) by Marjane Satrapi, also the Harvey Pekar stuff is great.

I love how he alternates between artists. It changes things up a bit and it feels like you get to see different sides of Harvey from the illustrators perspective. Definitely compliments the perfectly mundane episodes of his life.

Currently reading "No. 5" by Taiyo Matsumoto. It's got really cool illustration - different from other Japanese stuff.

What This Blog Is

Alright, I know there's too many blogs out there. But I really wanted to start this one because I wanted a place where people and friends could tell each other about books, movies, bands, websites, foods, places, things, just whatever.

of course there's other websites for this but a lot of times you have to search all over for them or like on amazon you have to click the "other people who listen to _____ also like _____." That's fine and all but it seems like you don't find the cool obscure stuff that way.

Here you can post any kind of recommendation that you want to suggest or even ask the question, "I really want to eat some good Mexican food in Salt Lake City but I don't know where to go..." and then maybe someone will reply, or maybe not.
(i actually stole the idea for this from a friend, or maybe you could say that his idea got me thinking about another idea that might be cool... nope i stole it)

Anyway, it's an experiment that may prove interesting. Mabye it's too generic to or too broad to work but I say - let's see what happens.