Nuclear Rocket Brain Surgery

Here, , in semi-formal form, is a song I've been tinkering with off-and-on (mostly off) for several months:

You sat there waiting by the church door
I ask how you were, “Good” you said
Your sigh of exasperation told me there was more
And it filled me with dread

We walked down the street, hand in hand
Sat beneath the shade of a tree
I felt you slipping away like a handful of sand
As you said to me

“You’re such a good person, but I don’t love you
Oh, I wish I did”
We both knew that left just one thing to do
Here's looking at you, kid.

CHORUS:
I was so in love with you
You did not love me
So now here I am feeling blue
It’s not the nuclear rocket brain surgery

Finishing this song was on my list of things to do
I always put it off until tomorrow
In the meantime I've been getting over you
What’s the half life of sorrow?

CHORSU 2:
I’ll break it down as simply as I can:
I loved you
You loved a married man
You were my biggest critic,
I was your biggest fan
It’s not the nuclear rocket
It’s not the nuclear rocket
It’s not the nuclear rocket brain surgery

Viñales photos up

I spelled the album name without the ñ, in case that causes problems with the URL. Once again I don't have captions up yet and may need to do some editing of the album later.

Child burned in bizarre 'redneck flamethrower' incident: Crime | adn.com

I decide to make the Anchorage Daily News my homepage to keep up with the news in the state where I grew up and this is one of the stories greeting me on the top page.

Havana Photos

A mere 6 months after my return to the U.S. I've finally re-posted my photos from Havana. While in Cuba I posted very few due to the slow internet connection. When I returned I took them down intending to put up more complete albums "soon" (but cutting out some of the worst photos) and kept putting it off. So here is an album with all my decent photos. They're pretty much in chronological order except for the ones of Ave. de los Presidentes. I made several attempts to take good pictures of all the statues and simply put the best ones all together in the spot in the sequence where I made my first attempt. I'll add captions "soon."

The Quiz

Pandora played me this song (on the station I simply call Russell's Station). It's by Hello Saferide. I've had it stuck in my head and just really like the lyrics. So I'm sharing them with you.

You look nice alright
and I like the way you nod after everything I say
like it actually means something
to you

And I like your record collection
Townes and Jens with a hint of Rickie Lee
And you’ve cleaned up the bathroom, made a really nice soup
but a bit too much sci-fi in your shelf with DVD’s

There are things you need to know about me
I’m weak right now, so weak right now
I need proof before I dare to open this heart
so I prepared a quiz for you

Would you freak out if I said i liked you?
Do you walk the line
Is your IQ higher than your neighbour’s
And is it very much higher than mine

Can you sleep when I grind my teeth
Do you look away if I slob when I eat
Will you let me be myself
Can you at all times wear socks, because I’m still scared of feet

And if I’d fall, would you pick me up
And if I’d fall, would you pick me up

Do you talk in the middle of Seinfeld
Do you read more than two books a month
Do you get racist or sexist when you’ve had a few
Is it fine if I make more money than you

Have you slept with any people I work with
Is there anyone you’d rather wish I’d be
Do you still keep pictures of old girlfriends
Are they prettier than me

And if I’d fall, would you pick me up
If I’d fall, would you pick me up

UPDATE 10/20/09: You can listen to the song on her MySpace page.

On Your Feet: High Heels' Effects on the Body - washingtonpost.com

I knew heels were bad for feet/legs/etc., but I didn't know they were this bad.

The elements of the perfect country song

I heard this on the radio the other night and thought the verse Goodman added is just great.

Well, a friend of mine named Steve Goodman wrote that song
And he told me it was the perfect country-western song
I wrote him back a letter and told him it was NOT the perfect country-western song because he hadn't said anything at all about
mama, or trains, or trucks, or prison, or gettin' drunk.
Well, he sat down and wrote another verse to the song and he sent it to me
And after reading it, I realized that my friend had written the perfect country-western song.
And I felt obliged to include it on this album. The last verse goes like this here:

Well, I was drunk the day my Mom got outta prison.
And I went to pick her up in the rain.
But, before I could get to the station in my pickup truck
She got runned over by a damned old train.

I grabbed the lyrics here.

funny pic from SF

I took this the weekend before last while staying with friends in the Castro neighborhood of San Francisco. It just struck me as the kind of ridiculous thing camera phones were made to capture.

"Skipper Dan" by Weird Al

I really like this video. It's a parody of a genre rather than a specific song. It's about a talented actor who doesn't get his break and ends up working as Skipper Dan on the Jungle Cruise Ride. It's both funny and sad.

Waiting in long lines at SFO with an empty stomach. Cuba prepared me well.

John Prine: musical salve

I've been familiar with his self-titled album for some time now, but bought "The Missing Years" in the past year or so. iTunes 8 has a new feature called Genius, which will build a playlist based on a song in your library. Think of it as Pandora with just your songs.

Anyhow, it recently picked John Prine's song "All the Best" for a playlist it made me and the song has been bouncing around in my mind for days. It starts out with these amazing lyrics:

I wish you love and happiness

I guess I wish you all the best

I wish you don't do like I do

And ever fall in love with someone like you.

They just jumped out at me and I had to stop what I was doing. The lyrics to the rest of the song are quite good as well.

A lot can happen in a year

In December 2007 I wrote a personal reflection that began with the following:

I do this thing where on the anniversary of an important event in my life I feel as though the events are happening again in another dimension. Or that there are echoes of the past felt on a yearly cycle.

I imagine the Earth as occupying the exact point in space it did a number of years earlier, even though my grade school knowledge of astronomy is enough to know that this is nonsense. The number of days in a year is not an interger, so two years ago I was not in this same spot relative to the sun. Close perhaps, in realtive terms, but nowhere near enough for the shadow of 2005 to overlap with corresponding objects in 2007.

All this falls apart even more when considering other frames of reference and how quickly the sun is moving through the galaxy and the galaxy through the universe. I've left the past far behind.

I'm having similar thoughts today. A year ago today I'd just gotten in from Brazil the day before. I was slated to have dinner with a Ph.D. student in English. We'd only met face-to-face three times, but had been exchanging long emails while I was in Brazil and had wonderful conversations via this modern medium.

I had no idea of all the things that were in store for me. New relationship. Chance to go to Cuba. Deciding to go there together. Having my paper accepted to a major conference (LASA). Failing the game theory section of my methodology exam. Successfully retaking it. Cuba! (for better and for worse...). LASA in Rio. Getting assigned to teach my own class on U.S. - Latin American relations (the interest that led me to UNC). Helping my mom move to Reno. End of relationship. Actually making progress on my research. Actually being able to do a little songwriting (see two items back). Learning so much and meeting amazing people at the Future Faculty Fellowship Program.

It'll be interesting to see what surprises next year has in store for me.

Dar liked my album cover!

Just got back from a Dar Williams concert at the Carrboro Arts Center. While having her sign a copy of her latest album we chatted a bit, mostly about her song Iowa. I told her I had it stuck in my head the entire time I was in the state and about using it to teach a friend guitar. She said to keep teaching people guitar. I gave her a copy of my CD. She was very impressed with the cover and said it "takes the prize" or something to that effect and will try to listen to it, though the adoption of a young kid makes her a terrible correspondent and she probably won't be able to write. Resisting so many bad puns on her song "If I Wrote You" that would be lost on readers not familiar with her songs...

Glad that the CD art made such a good impression. I really want to start gigging more this year. I say that every year, but I suppose my playing at some open mics already bodes well. Also, my teaching schedule (MWF at 10) is more conducive to staying up a bit late than my schedule last last fall.

videos of me playing at open mics

These are both from the open mic at The Looking Glass. Thanks to Bruce for organizing the open mics and recording the videos. Below the link to each video I give the song(s) played and the year written. I hope some of you will enjoy them.

July 21

"Unprepared" (2003)
"Going Away" (2001)

August 4

"By The Way" (2008)

UPDATE 8/14: I realized I never listed a set list for Aug. 4. I played

• Why does it have to be so hard?
• By the Way.
• Ramblin' On

If there was a 4th song I no longer remember it.