There’s Always This Year - Hanif Abdurraqib I started the year with this wonderful book. It is a multi-layered examination of the places we call home and how we relate to them as we age, all set against a backdrop of basketball. For the most part, Abdurraqib’s tale follows the career of LeBron James, from high school phenom to his first run with the Cavaliers, to The Decision and move to Miami, and finally his return to Cleveland and winning the title the city sought for so long.
Hope you had a good Monday celebrating the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. and all he stood for. Equal opportunity, justice, empathy, love. We’ve come a long way since he was murdered. Yesterday was a reminder that we still have a long way to go.
Let’s review some stuff that happened over the past few days.
KU Hoops I’m about done with this team. Not in terms of watching, I’ll always watch the games.
With one more big football game scheduled for tonight, I’ll hold off on the weekend summary until tomorrow. That also allows me to devote more space to writing about high school hoops.
City Tournament The semifinals of the Indy City tournament were Thursday. On the JV side, L and her pals crushed HCHS by 28, opening the game on a 17–0 run. They beat the same girls by 17 a month ago.
The new music for the new year continues to pile up, so for at least the next couple weeks I’m going to share extra-stuffed playlists. Think of them as musical firewood to keep you warm as the polar vortex announces its unwelcome arrival.
open.spotify.com/playlist/…
“Here We Go Crazy” - Bob Mould Hey, Bob Mould has new music out! Hey, I just got tickets to see Bob Mould in May!
“Sugar in the Tank” - Julien Baker, TORRES Well here is an interesting-as-hell test case for my Country Or Not identifier.
Exactly two months since her last game, L finally returned to the court last night. So a quick update is in order.
We knew going in that she probably would not play much. This was our opening game in the Indianapolis City tournament, so with (likely) games on Thursday and Friday and Tuesday’s opponent not being very good, there was no need for her to go all out.
She checked in for the first time with just over a minute to play in the first quarter, to loud cheers from all her teammates.
Two weeks into the New Year and there are a couple posts I’ve been putting off for far too long.
Before I get to a quick health update on your beloved blogger, I can’t believe I forgot to include a blurb about the Pacers yesterday. So…
Pacers Hey, my Indiana Pacers have won six in a row! Including a comprehensive win Sunday over the Cavaliers, which broke Cleveland’s 12-game winning streak.
A quieter weekend, although there were still enough activities over the past 5–6 days to justify an overly-long blog post.
Weather A little over three new inches of snow Friday, on top of the 9+ we received last Sunday/Monday. Our street is one of the few side streets in our area that gets attention; the neighborhood behind us pays a private contractor to pass through and we enjoy the benefits of that.
We’re finally back in the normal swing of things this week. I’m pleased to say my various new music playlists are being refilled after the holiday break. I should have no trouble coming up with regular-sized playlists full of new music for the foreseeable future.
open.spotify.com/playlist/…
“Mallee Country” - Indian Pacific Nothing like some lovely, jangle pop from Down Under to make you think of warmer days. Especially good on a day when our second snow storm of the week is expected.
KU basketball has become a roller coaster ride. Which is not the coolest thing when you are a fan.
A week ago they lost to an undermanned, sleep-deprived West Virginia team at home. It was the first time the Mountaineers had ever won at Allen Fieldhouse. In true WVU form, they tried their hardest to blow a big lead, but KU could only tie then have two awful possessions when they had the chance to take the lead.
Chart Week: January 7, 1978 Song: “Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue” - Crystal Gayle Chart Position: #16, 22nd week on the chart. Peaked at #2 for three weeks in November/December 1977.
What is the first American Top 40 show I remember listening to? If you know me, you understand that I wish I could identify that broadcast to give it the appropriate commemorative post. My first vivid memories of hearing Casey’s voice for which I can clearly identify the year are from 1978.
Friday I had an appointment to get C’s iPad looked at. After confirming it needed a new battery, the guy helping me said the replacement would take about a week to arrive, so it would probably be “next Monday.” He paused, we looked at each other for a moment, and then we both started laughing. We both thought Friday was Monday because of the New Year’s holiday. Time and space gets freaky over the holidays!
What better time than a snowy Sunday to finally share the links I’ve been stacking up over the past month or so.
After reading a 007 novel recently, I wondered why we haven’t heard a timeline for when the movie franchise will launch its post-Daniel Craig era. Turns out there is a lot of drama between the long-time producer of the series and Amazon, who now own the rights to it.
Still not back in a normal music groove yet, so today you get one of my occasional, fun, “let Spotify spit some random tunes out and make a playlist from them” deals.
open.spotify.com/playlist/…
“Spin The Bottle” - The Juliana Hatfield Three What a great blast from the early Nineties.
“Needle” - Middle Kids Even their “mediocre” songs from overlooked EPs sound great.
“Dance Of The Clairvoyants” - Pearl Jam It was nearly five years ago we were excited about this PJ song.
I completed my final book of 2024 late Saturday/early Sunday as I was battling some insomnia. It was my 62nd book of the year, making 2024 one of my best reading years ever.[1] I read seven books in two different months, six books in three separate months, and never fewer than three books in a 30/31-day stretch. Pretty good work. Now I get to start all over again.
The Siege - Ben MacIntyre I’ve read two of MacIntyre’s books before, and heard about this latest one via a couple different podcasts.
Holiday Shit Elf Christmas Vacation A Christmas Story Die Hard Assorted SNL holiday sketches A’s all around. Band Aid - The Making Of The Original ’Do They Know It’s Christmas?’ Not a true documentary but rather a collection of the raw film shot on November 25, 1984, the day the vocals were recorded for this holiday classic. A remarkable view of a moment in time that became eternal.
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Holiday Baking Championship Surprise winner!
As usual for the first post of the New Year, here are the artists I listened to most over the past 365, errr, 366 days. As you might expect, when Pearl Jam puts out a new album that is really good and also perform in Indy, they end up dominating.
Pearl Jam - 725 Middle Kids - 274 The War on Drugs - 197 Jack White - 188 Wild Pink - 170 Hurray For The Riff Raff - 153 Waxahatchee - 148 Crowded House - 131 Japandroids - 124 Spoon - 123 And now the all time numbers.
We had a pretty good holiday week. Lots of good times and good food with family. The weather was mostly decent, dreary but unseasonably warm all week. There was some good basketball.
The only bummer was I caught cold #1 of the season last weekend and it wore me down several days. Christmas Day and the day after were when I felt the worst, which kind of sucked. Luckily on the scale of worst colds I’ve ever had, this was maybe a 5, so more annoying that truly debilitating.
It’s taken a little longer than normal - I am almost certain this is the latest in the calendar year I’ve ever posted it - but at last I can reveal my 20 favorite songs of the year.
This year I’ve had the the least enthusiasm I can recall about the process.[1] Usually I’ll dive into the songs in mid-fall and slowly get obsessed with the list, or at least with certain songs on it.
Christmas week has finally arrived! The countdown that begins sometime around October 1 in my mind is just about done.
Reading through old posts, I see I often updated you all on my state of holiday spirit. This has been a weird year for me. I’ve listened to less holiday music than anytime this century maybe? Don’t get me wrong, I’ve still listened to plenty, probably more than the average person.
For part two, the annual review of my favorite songs of the past 20 years. Remember there have been ties for #1 a few years, thus the extra tracks. Also don’t forget that these lists remain static once published. There are several songs I would replace with others if I re-evaluated their years today. Flags fly forever, and favorite songs of the year never die.
open.spotify.com/playlist/…
2004 - “Float On” - Modest Mouse 2005 - “Gone Missing” - Maximo Park 2006 - “Star Witness” - Neko Case 2007 - “Intervention” - Arcade Fire 2008 - “The Modern Leper” - Frightened Rabbit 2009 - “Whirring” - The Joy Formidable 2010 - “FootShooter” - Frightened Rabbit 2011 - “He Gets Me High” - Dum Dum Girls 2012 - “The House That Heaven Built” - Japandroids 2013 - “Holy” - Frightened Rabbit 2014 - “Red Eyes” - The War On Drugs 2015 - “California Nights” - Best Coast 2016 - “To Know You” - Wild Nothing 2017 - “Pain” / “Strangest Thing” - The War On Drugs 2018 - “Night Shift” - Lucy Dacus 2019 - “Weird Ways” - Strand of Oaks 2020 - “Can’t Do Much” - Waxahatchee 2021 - “Stacking Chairs” - Middle Kids 2022 - “the man himself” / “in the wake of your leave” - Gang of Youths 2023 - “The Window” - Ratboys