Probably The Final Blog Of The Year

Geez, 2008 was kind of a tough one, you guys. I mean, not really for me, just in general. Actually, 2008 was pretty alright- good even. On to the bullet points!

-Obligatory Christmas info: long vacation, too much food, great (cold) weather. Ranch catastrophes are commonplace this time of year, so we all had to take care of a dying goat- just another day in Paso. All the family was around pretty much the whole time, which is rare. With multiple people, however, comes disease- and I've spent Christmas eve until now as a congested, sore-throated mess.

-Don't buy things from Best Buy. I should've known, especially cause I read Consumerist damn near everyday. Collecting X-Mas money, gift cards and etc., Dawn and I decided to buy an LCD HDTV. I didn't want to order it because I didn't want to deal with delivery hassles (not being home, etc.) and I was sketched out by Circuit City's impending bankruptcy, so I cracked and went to Fucking Best Buy (as it shall henceforth be known). The one by my work didn't have the approprate models in stock, so I drove to Costa Mesa, where they did. After long considerations about which picture was better (Samsung vs. Sony), I went with the Sony, bought it, got it home, unboxed it, and immediatly re-boxed it. Because the screen was shattered. Awesome. Took it back less than an hour after I bought it, when the Fucking Best Buy "manager" told me this doesn't happen to tvs so they couldn't help me, becuase it was something I did. Wrong, asshole. After some, shall we say, stern words, said Fucking Best Buy "manager" dissapeared and someone brought me a new TV, whose box I promptly opened in the store to verify the lack of shattering on the tv screen. Fuckers.

-I was able to summarize my musical taste with one trip to Boo Boos. I Purchased records by 2 artists: Paul McCartney (McCartney and Ram) and Sonic Youth (Confusion Is Sex, and SYR 8 live with Merzbow). One end of the rock music spectrum to the other: oldtimey-folk-classicrock-avantgarde-postpunk-noise-improvisation. Awesome.

-New Years plans: Big Bear. I've probably spent more time in Big Bear over New Years than anywhere else othe than my Mom's house. It's my brother Tim's bday on the first, so we will do much celebrating up there. Should be good times.

-Wedding update: date is set, catering booked, invitations designed, (cup)cake(s) tasted, dress (apparently- not my department) picked out. Not too bad for only one month of being engaged.

Things That Have Happened (to me) Since The Last Time I Got Gas for $1.86

Yes, the threshold has been crossed. Gas at this particular gas station is actually below $1.86 at the time of this writing- it's 7-11, 17th St, Costa Mesa here. This is a memorable amount is because I was helping Dawn move into the old Costa Mesa apartment, and the day after driving a miserable, air conditioning-less, radio-less huge U-Haul truck from Paso to the Mesa in the middle of August (2003, pending verification), I couldn't help thinking how screwed I was getting by filling up the truck at the 7-11 down the street for $1.86/gal. Little did I know, right? Get ready for a big ass incomplete sentence, starting NOW!

Graduated college, Paso earthquake, layoff, move to So Cal, collect unemployment, blow savings, internship (Adam LaRue is the greatest), "Sweet" music industry job, overworked & underpaid in shitty Garden Grove (excellent freinds made, however), TiVo zombie initiation, getting a cat, early (forced) retirement from music tastemaking (Sierra and I broke Fall Out Boy. Really. Kinda. Yes, unfortunately all in a days work), Dawn graduates law school ass-kickingly, European Sojurn, The Lost Year (which I will not speak of other than saying unemployment, depression, temp jobs), going to the gym, getting my shit together, getting a "real" job, new laptop (!), de-vegitarianizing, expanding liquid horizions, joining/quitting a drummerless band, moving to Corona Del Mar, getting engaged.
So there we are, up to last week. Weirdness!

The Current "Stuff."

Records:
-Brian Eno: Taking Tiger Mountian (By Strategy)
-Mogwai [as usual]: The Hawk Is Howling & My Father My King
-The Beatles: The White Album
-Melvins: The Maggot [Dude, I like it! Sorry for calling you out in the past Buzz]
-The Andrew Oldham Orchestra: The Rolling Stones Songbook [The last song on here may sound very familiar to you. Research!]
-Mastodon: Blood Mountain
-Scott Walker: Scott 2
-To buy: new (International) Noise Conspiracy, new phono preamp

Other Music Stuff:
-Geeking out over Mastodon recording a new record: check this and this.
-Have a bunch of Boris records to go through that I "got" from my brother. He loves the sludge-metal, that's for sure.

Holiday Attack:
-Other than getting engaged (geez- obvs, Brian), Thanksgiving was memorable for these reasons: A)The worst heartburn of my life. B) Drinking alcohol before 9 am for several days in a row (see "A" above). C) Playing video games with parents/adult family (it was Wii, but still. My Mom thinks creating "Mii"s is the most hillarious thing ever).
-I started Christmas shopping earlier than ever this year. Congrats to myself for good planning/budgeting.
-XMas tree this weekend?

Wedding Attack:
-1 week into planning and shit's going pretty well. After some haggling over the date (and many, many congrats to Megan and Morgan), things are going nicely. Only 10 months to go!
-The first thing I did when I got home and plugged my music hard drive in was start playlisting. I AM UNSTOPPABLE, and possibly the best DJ ever.

I did some of my own polling.

-Chance of celebration tomorrow: 96.3%
-Chance of cheesecake tomorrow: 100%
-Chance of UPS losing my birthday present (from Dawn), finding it, and subsequently delivering it last Saturday night between 6 & 10 pm: 100%
-Chance of my day being ruined by the DMV tomorrow: 30%
-Chance of my Halloween playlist having been awesome: 100%
-Chance of Proposition 8 supporters being horrible people: 100% (This one has been independently verified. BY REASON.)
-Chance of my brother and his friends being badass and stealing "about 30" Yes on 8 signs as well as "some" Yes on 4 signs: 100%
-Chance of me being sketched out that my polling place is a residence: 75%
-Chance of rain tomorrow: 20%
-Chance of me going to the record store tomorrow: 50%
-Chance of me buying a new guitar pedal in the next month: 95%
-Chance of my Dad or Grandpa waking me up with a phone call tomorrow morning: 85%
-Chance of above, plus my Mom or Sister: 100%
-Chance of me taking my birthday off work for the first time ever (except when I called in sick to work at CCS): 100%
-Chance of me watching a music DVD tomorrow (most likely a Beatles Anthology episode, or Refused Are Fucking Dead): 70%

Locale

Here's some lists I made based on where I grew up and where I live now.

5 Best things about growing up in Paso:
1. The splendid isolation of Hall Manor
2. Living far out of town forced me to nerd out (books, computers, guitars), and initiated a renaissance when I got the drivers licsense.
3. Oldest friends
4. Highschool shenanigans and/or hijinks.
5. Punk rock and skateboarding

Best things about living in Orange County:
1. Best beaches in America
2. Weather
3. Entertainment (including proximity to LA/SD)
4. Cleanliness
5. Employment

Best things about Corona Del Mar specifically:
1. Awesome shit in walking distance
2. Hearing the waves, sea lions and foghorns in the morning
3. The smoothest paved streets I've yet to experience=skateboard pleasure
4. Trees, grass
5. Thai Del Mar

Worst things about Paso:
1. People: white trash, lake rats, motocross bros, general brew-ha action, druggie ass meth burnouts, people from highschool I don't want to see at the movie theater over the holidays
2. Christian Conservative assholes
3. Heat. And Cold.
4.  The wine "industry"
5. Isolation

Worst things about Orange County
1. Christian Conservative assholes
2. People: white trash, lake rats, motocross bros, general brew-ha action, scene kids
3. Wealth and sense of entitlement
4. Weather
5. Music scene

Best restaurants in SLO County
1. Cafe Roma
2. Thai Classic
3. The new Italian place across from Boo Boo's
4. Tio Albertos
5. Big Sky Cafe

Best restaurants in my immediate area:
1. Thai Del Mar
2. Giorgio La Trattoria
3. El Matador (tied with) Great Mex
4. Native Foods
5. Bandera has fabulous pork loin

Worst towns in Orange County:
1. Laguna Hills/Aliso Viejo/Mission Viejo/Lake Forest faceless, culture-free staletropolis
2. Huntington Beach broverload/hoverload
3. Garden Grove, shit covered in shit, baked on asphalt
4. Fountain Valley, like above, but literally smelling of shit.
5. Fullerton should probably be reclassified as part of Riverside, but must remain free of too much scorn because Fender (and G&L) originated there.

Recent Happenings

Not too much, really.

-My Wolverine-like healing factor. After finishing some (eventually fantastic) Steak Au Poive in the oven, I grabbed the handle of my trusty All-Clad 10" fry pan, only to absolutely sizzle the palm of my left hand with the most painful burn I've ever experienced.After several hours of palming a cold beer bottle (the shape contours nicely to the palm, of course), and some neosporin the pain subsided, and the blisters were gone in less than two days. Under a week later, there is almost no evidence of the event. Such an injury would have healed on our old X-Man freind in mere moments, but I like to think I'm somewhere in between Wolvie and an average dude.

-iPhone firmware v2.0. As if enough hasn't already been written on the internet about this... I'll keep it short. The iTunes servers crashing at about 8 am friday moring left me phoneless until about 1 pm. But jesus, it was definately worth it. The apps already available are great, and they're only going to get great-er. If someone doesn't write a Pro-Tools/Logic wireless controller app and a Kaoss Pad/theremin emulator, I'm gonna have to learn to code it myself.

-The Dark Night. I've successfully avoided seeing all previews for the movie, except the one I couldn't avoid before (I think) Indian Jones ATKOTCS. I think I may be on to something here.

-Paul's Boutique. My current musical obsession- especially Looking Down The Barrel of a Gun. One hell of a jam, and pretty fuckin' gangster too. A whole album of miniature masterpeices.

-EBow. Finally got one, and it's super sweet. It seems to overdrive my pickups more than I remember the ones I've played in the past have. Maybe that's just because I'm doing it right now. The one problem is that it can't do chords, but that's what cello/violin bows are for.

-Freedom Guitar San Diego. What guitar shops are closed on Saturdays? Re-fuckin-diculous. Our Fender Showman finding mission was cut tragically short. At least we got to go to the zoo... Oh, wait.

-San Diego Zoo. Yes, I've confirmed my hunch that zoos are a major bum-out. Most of the animals looked really depressed- especially the lions, bears (Sun and Grizzly) and the elephants, which I found quite disheartening since San Diego is considerered to be quite an advanced establishment. I'd hate to see the zoos that aren't so generally well thought of. The gorillas seemed pretty impervious to the sweaty masses behind the glass, which was very cool. There was also a particularly active (and impressive) mountain lion- it chased after one small kid that ran by and totally stared down some other kid that was making growling noises at it. Had the majestic beast not been in a cage, the first kid would have been quite an afternoon snack. Awesome. They should let one zoo patron be devoured by a wild animal every year or so to keep everyone's respect level up. I think the San Francisco Zoo has already implemented this program.

-Fireworks from the porch. One of the many benefits of the new pad.

-Oh, and I almost forgot: The God Delusion. Can't put it down. My only critisicm is that I'm afraid I'll like it so much I'll finish it very quickly. Read it. Now.

Basic Boring Update

-Moving May 1st: Moving in is fun, moving out sucks. Come visit me- four blocks from the beach! Gas stove, but no a/c (bummer).
-Ate waaaay too much last weekend, and played waaaay too much Smash Bros. (thanks Chase).
-Tax Time
-St. Patrick's day is horrrrrible. "Celtic punk" bands are horrrrrible.
-Toooooooo maaaaaaaany repeateeeeeeeed letteeeeeeeeersssssssss.
-Music stuff:
New Raconteurs today. GO BUY IT.
New Nick Cave in a week or two.
90's cover band (possibly) on the horizon.
Song Ideas (on the basis of possible audience appreciation):
Foo Fighters: Monkeywrench
Toadies: Possum Kingdom
Breeders: Cannonball
Radiohead: Creep
some Beck song that's not too hard to recreate live
Blind Melon: No Rain
Cranberries: Zombie
Semisonic: Closing Time
Fastball: The Way
some Smashing Pumpkins song
Everclear: Santa Monica
Folk Implosion: Natural One
Mazzy Star: Fade Into You
My Bloody Valentine (i wish)
Oasis
Pixies

Going Back On My Word, Or, Overgeneralizing About Music and The Great Meat Experiment

Yeah, I know that's a sweet title for a post.
First things first:

1.Overgeneralizing About Music
I've said for years that I hate Ween. This is generally true, though it dawned on me today that there is one exception.
Buenas Tardes Amigo
I like to think of it as a collaboration between Inigo Montoya (you killed his father, prepare to die), Ennio Morricone (thanks, Captain Obvious), and Walter/Wendy Carlos (there is a definite Kubrick thing going on in the background tracks), but it's really just Ween. Trust me, it's a sweet tune with a ton of interesting layers. I believe I first heard this song years ago on a snowboard movie soundtrack (Peter Line's part), and I have, in fact, always liked it. Plus the Ween dudes get points for being on a Desert Sessions.
But they are still pretty fucking annoying otherwise.
And, like divine clockwork, a newer Radiohead song ("Bodysnatchers," according to iTunes) comes on the radio. And yes, I'm actually into it. Well, the bassline mostly. Thom Yorke fucking ruins the rest of the song, as usual.

And in case you were wondering (you shouldn't have been), here's some electro-ish jams I've been into these days:
-LCD Soundsytem: Someone Great [It sounds like an old song, but I haven't figured out which one yet.]
-MGMT: Time To Pretend [Good lyrics and Zelda-esque music- a winning combination.]
-Teddybears: Punkrocker [Actually, I've been into this song, hard, since last summer when Shelby turned me on to it. It is, as they say, "Awesome."]

2. The Great Meat Experiment
It's no secret to most that I was a vegetarian for a looooooong time. Seriously. Like 10+ years. But then I got bored. And started becoming obsessed with Anthony Bourdain. And curious. I never really had a reason for not eating meat (I don't particulary care about animals, except cats, and most people don't think they taste very good anyway). So, for 2008, it was on. Or off. Or Whatever.

And I'm not going back.
Mostly cause of shredded beef tacos. Here's the scorecard so far:
Mexican style shredded beef tacos/burritos, etc.: Fuck yeah.
Chicken: meh. Whatevs.
Pork/Ham: Good stuff, to be sure. I gotta get my hands on some prosciutto and some fine bacon (not Farmer John).
Steak: Kinda hard to cook, since my grill's broken, but still pretty good.
In-N-Out Burger: Not impressed. I prefer, taste-wise, In-N-Out grilled cheeses.

All in all, a success. Don't think I'm heading off to McDonalds anytime soon- this is a new opportunity for snobbery. But I still like to keep 'em guessing.

Fuck, man.

I've have really intense blogger's-block, which is probably a good thing.

In the meantime, I thought this was really funny:
Patton vs The Famous Bowl

(oooh, a Patton Oswalt link! How hipstery!)
Oh yeah, I really like Ratatouille, btw.