We’re fall breaking it this weekend. No trips or super exciting and unique plans on the agenda. Just flu shots, playdates, sleepovers, and general chilling. Here are some songs that I’ve been listening to this week, and thus they feel fall break-y to me. open.spotify.com/user/224a…
“Queens” - La Sera. La Sera put out an album earlier this year that got fine reviews, but which I did not like that much. Then they released an EP of extra tracks a couple weeks back, and I dug it the most.
A few assorted tidbits for Tuesday.
Here’s the thing about Indian Summer: you never fully appreciate it. Sure, you can talk in wonder about it being in the mid–80s in the back-half of October. You can take a long lunch, leave work early, or just take the day off to get outside. But as good as these days feel, we are also craving those cool, autumn breezes. It looks like the weather here is going to shift dramatically in the next 36 hours.
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“Shadrach” - Beastie Boys. None of this week’s new releases really piqued my interest, so after dropping the girls at school this morning I threw on Paul’s Boutique and have been reliving the first month of my freshman year of college. At least musically. I haven’t been skipping classes and puking in trashcans. “Positron” - Palace Winter. Another very fine track - this one recorded live - from PW. “Tiny Fires” - Kevin Morby.
I went through a stretch a few weeks back where I was watching a lot of Veep, the HBO comedy where Julia Louis-Dreyfus plays Vice President Selina Meyer.[1] And this week I finally cracked the seal on our DVR’s collection of The Good Place, the new Michael Schur comedy starring Kristen Bell and Ted Danson.
That combination means I can finally share this piece from a few weeks back in which Steven Hyden posits that Louis-Dreyfus and Danson are the two finest comedy actors of the modern age.
Before I jump into the true topic of this post, a quick realization I just had. Lately many of the family stories I’ve been sharing in detail here have already been posted to Facebook in much more simplified form. Since the bulk of my regular readers are friends on Facebook, that means you’ve often had a sneak preview of the story about X or Y before I get around to putting a few hundred words about it up here.
I’m having a fun morning. I’m searching on what movies are appropriate for a 12-year-old’s sleepover.
Up until now it’s been pretty easy to pick movies to show when our girls have friends over. But now that M is up on the verge of being a teenager, you can’t throw in a Barbie movie or even a good animated flick like Inside Out. She needs something that is a little more grown up for her and her friends who are sleeping over tonight to watch.
Well, the MLB playoffs are here, a bittersweet time for me - and many of my readers - for sure. There is a sadness that the Royals aren’t part of the festivities this year. The last two Octobers were so much fun, even if they were intensely stressful. I imagine my blood pressure will appreciate watching games more casually this year. Yet there will be the constant references to the Royals for the next month, which will be good.
A pretty solid month of reading in September keeps me right on 52-book pace for the year.
Palace of Treason - Jason Matthews. I read Matthews’ excellent Red Sparrow three or four years ago. Turns out Matthews enjoyed those characters and settings so much, he’s decided to turn it into a trilogy. Volume two just hit the shelves in June.
Matthews, a retired CIA officer, does another first-rate job in building a tale of modern espionage.
Yesterday was a very busy day, which makes me a day late in offering up my birthday post for L. Our youngest turned 8 yesterday, and everything about the day fit her perfectly.
As a lot of you saw, I posted some pics of her to Facebook with a little birthday announcement. At the end of the day, I showed her how many people had liked it or sent birthday greetings her way in the comments.
As promised last week, a video and playlist of older songs I’ve heard on SiriusXM over the past 15 days or so. youtu.be/dbXzAAXOB…
“Bye Bye Love” - The Cars. I heard this song a week or so ago on one of the SiriusXM throwback stations. As I listened, and considered it’s greatness, I thought about how many hits The Cars had over the years. I bet most people, when asked to name their three favorite Cars songs, wouldn’t think of “Bye Bye Love.
Our academic year is off to a decent start. The girls got their mid-quarter progress reports a couple weeks back, and all three are doing well.
C has really taken to fourth grade, which is when the teachers at St. P’s begin pushing students to be self-motivated for getting their work done. Unlike the K–3 years, we don’t have to review her assignments and sign her folder every night. She’s done a great job of balancing her practices and games for kickball and cross country, getting all her school work done, and still having some time to herself each night.
Friday night was fun. Perhaps it didn’t live up to every expectation I had for the evening, but my philosophy for the night was I would not complain about anything that involved a free concert by my favorite band within almost throwing distance of my house. There was a quibble here and there, but overall it was a very good evening.
We were going with our friends K and T. K went to the Frightened Rabbit show with me last April, and he and his wife T went to the Revivalist show with us a couple weeks back.
Music post #2 for the day. Consequence of Sound released their list of the top 100 one-hit-wonders of all time earlier this week. It’s a lot of fun.
All music lists are ripe for being picked apart for any number of reasons. I think one-hit-wonder lists are especially troublesome.
You can argue for hours about how to define a one-hit-wonder band in the first place. For example, Kris Kross had another top 20 song (“Warm It Up” peaked at #13), but 95% of people only remember “Jump”).
It’s a big music day around here. I had a nice Friday Playlist ready to go - mostly built on older songs this week - but I’ve decided to hold that off until next week so I can focus on a couple other music-related things to share.
That’s right, Kansas has a new album out today! (Insert record scratching sound here.) That’s actually true, which is bizarre. But, no, that’s not what has me excited today.
It was not to be. M’s kickball team got routed in the city championship game yesterday, 27–1 in five-plus innings.[1] Their opponents were just too good in every aspect of the game.
St. B’s had a 5–0 lead after one, 10–1 after two, and 13–1 after three. Although the margin wasn’t great at that point, the game felt over. Our girls looked defeated and were struggling to make plays they had made all year.
Game day!
In about nine hours we’ll have a new sixth grade city champion in kickball, and M’s team just might be that team. It’s a perfect day for kickball, too! It’s going to be hot and clear, which is ideal for heating the asphalt to well over 100° - so everyone - players, coaches, and families watching - is all sweating uncontrollably. I especially enjoy it when my sweat drips onto the scorebook and smears my notations.
Awwwwww yeaaaaaaaaah! It’s leaf-changing season, ya’ll! That’s right, the time of year when your gutters are constantly overflowing with dead leaves and seed pods and your yard needs to be raked/mowed every 45 minutes so your lawn, which is still trying to recover from the summer, doesn’t get smothered before the winter. It’s also the time of year when we can suddenly see our douchebag neighbors who are blocked by our trees, bushes, and crazy weeds we let grow in the summer to gain a little privacy.
The countdown continues for the big kickball game Wednesday. Other things distracted me a bit over the weekend, but I imagine the nerves are going to start to kick in again later today.
The distractions were good ones, though. First, C had her best ever finish in her cross country meet Saturday. She finished 16th in her first meet of the year. She was running against 5th and 6th graders in that race and there were over 100 girls total in her race.
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“Hard Girls” - KT Tunstall. Tunstall has been a little uneven over her past couple records. Her new album has not received great reviews, but the good songs are a return to the smart pop sound that was the core of her breakthrough.
“Buffalo Stance” - Neneh Cherry. One of the great one-hit-wonders of all time. A legitimately fantastic song that came along at just the right moment. I remember shooting around in Robinson Gymnasium one Friday afternoon my freshman year of college while the KU Crimson Girls practiced a routine to this one court over.
Well, maybe my stressing about games played on diamonds isn’t completely over for this year. Despite the Royals season spiraling down the drain, I have one more game to get myself worked up about: M’s kickball team made the city championship game. They will play for the title next Wednesday. And I’m already a nervous wreck.
Her team had a fantastic regular season. They won their first game by nine runs over a very tough team.