It is June 27, 2023. That means this site, or at least its earliest version, was Internet birthed 20 years ago today. That first post is here. I’ll be addressing it directly soon. A lot sure has happened in that span, hasn’t it? If you want a full accounting you can dig through the over 3300 posts I’ve racked up since then.[1] S and I had been married for nearly two weeks when I posted that first entry.
L had a game early Thursday evening and then wanted to stay and watch her teammates play in the second game, so I didn’t make it home until the late teens of the NBA Draft. Thus no extensive breakdown this year. Gradey Dick was, apparently, the star of the show for his outrageous suit. I got a few texts about him from non-KU people. I heard a lot of commentators destroying him for his fit.
Quite a few things to discuss this week, so I’m going to split this into two posts. The personal stuff first, the NBA Draft stuff later on today. Weather We dodged a big ol’ bullet Sunday when storms roared through our area. There was a tornado on the ground about 10 minutes north of us. Several on the ground on the south side of Indy did significant damage. There was fairly large hail within two miles of our house.
open.spotify.com/playlist/… “Body” - Briston Maroney It’s always exciting when young artists prepare to release their second album, and it seems like it will be as good as their first one. “Roll the Credits” - Danielle Ponder As if it isn’t enough that Ms. Ponder can sing like this, she also used to be a public defender. What are all my attorney friends doing in their free time? “Hard to Build. Easy to Break.
I have not returned to baseball this year. The Royals are truly terrible - on pace for their worst season ever - and have given me no reason to drop my boycott of the sport, prompted when the dishonest and corrupt combination of MLB ownership and commissioner Rob Manfred manufactured last year’s labor strife.[1] I don’t have much idea what’s going on in the sport right now, other than the Royals sucking.
A rather uninteresting weekend around here, even with an extra day thrown in, so let’s jump straight into our latest exploration of Old School American Top 40s. Chart Week: June 23, 1979 Song: “I Want You To Want Me” - Cheap Trick Chart Position: #16, 9th week on the chart. Peaked at #7 for two weeks in July. Sometimes our musical memories trick us into believing a band was more popular that it actually was.
Boy do I have a list for you this week. A couple gems I’ve come up with on my own. Some discovered via Spotify’s suggestions. Two new entries in the “Country Or Not” category. One track from a performer facing a huge challenge. And our latest shoutout to a lost artist. open.spotify.com/playlist/… “No Reason” - Sunny War If this song doesn’t get you tapping your toes, snapping your fingers, nodding your head, or wiggling your ass a little, I don’t want to be friends with you.
There’s been a lot of talk about M here lately. Maybe too much talk. A few words about her sisters. Middle Sister C has had a pretty quiet summer break so far. She has filled M’s spot working for their aunt the chef on weekends a couple times. She will take that job over full time in August so this has been good preparation for that. It’s good that she’s made a little money.
Quick Blog Note You may have noticed that I updated the header image of the site. I actually did a little bit of Dicking Around™ with the entire site over the weekend. I installed a couple new themes and played around with them for about five minutes before switching back to the one I’ve been using for five years. I was content to swap in the new image, stolen from one of the themes I sampled, and call it a night.
A busy weekend in the past and a packed day ahead of me, so we’ll get caught up tomorrow. For now, some links I’ve collected in recent weeks. First, a rather chilling account by a Ukrainian from the front lines of the war with Russia. I haven’t had a chance to personally kill any Russians. They say it’s good luck to kill someone in front of you. But in this war you rarely see the enemy.
open.spotify.com/playlist/… “It’s Alive!” - Ratboys It’s been a fairly slow album year; my New Music list that I check each Friday has the fewest entries I can recall. But I just added one for Ratboys on August 25 that has me very excited. “The Narcissist” - Blur Their first new music in ages, and it sounds exactly like how music from a once-huge band who has drifted for years should sound like.
When I watched part of Real Genius a week ago, it got me thinking about the movies I watched the most between 1985 and 1994.[1] These were the glory days of movies on TV, a time when there was a great chance you would find one of, say, 40 different movies playing on one channel or another. There was no better way to waste time than flipping through your cable dial to find one of your favorites, then not moving until it was over.
I’ve been in a weird reading space since May began. Over that span I did not enjoy two of the books I have completed. As I mentioned in my previous RN post, I only finished Bret Easton Ellis’ The Shards because I’m stubborn. I think that effort wore me down, as shortly afterward I quit a book after struggling with it for over a week. Put all of that together and in the last four weeks I’ve only logged two books into my reading list for 2023.
Movies, Shows, etc Ted Lasso, season two Got S caught up. She enjoyed it. I don’t think my second viewing changed my opinion of it. It was funnier, deeper, and more emotional than season one. But it also lacked the magic of that first year. Season one wins in a nose because it didn’t have the two extra episodes that messed with the momentum of the rest of the season. A-
We’ve hit a cycle of boom-bust weekends that should extend at least a couple more weeks. This was one of the bust weekends. At least for four of us. M had parties all weekend, I believe she had 12 she could have attended from Friday through Sunday. We met her at one of her buddy’s on Sunday and she looked totally wiped out. So naturally we - meaning S and I and other parents who have known M for years - made fun of her for being so tired from just having fun.
The bulk of this week’s playlist is one of my dumb group of songs that share some minor trait. The music is good even if the “concept” is stupid. open.spotify.com/playlist/… “Summer Breeze” - Seals and Crofts It’s summertime, bitches. “High Life” - Bloc Party “American Candy” - The High Water Marks “Ease On” - The High Violets “Standing on an Empire” - Highspire “It’s Fine” - Bethany Cosentino A bunch of songs or acts with that all contain the word high.
Some notes about the end of Ted Lasso. To reset, S had never watched the show before, so in April we watched together from the very first episode. We got caught up three weeks ago, watching the final three episodes on the nights they were released. After binging 30 or so in about 20 nights, I hated going old school and having to wait seven days for the next one.
We had our final official event at St P’s last night: the graduation of L’s 8th grade class. We got a new priest a little over a year ago after our long-time, very popular priest retired. The new guy has received a decidedly mixed reaction. As I’m not Catholic I won’t get into the details. That said, homie knocked out the Mass in 40 minutes, which I fully support. The graduation ceremony afterward went well.
It was a very busy, extra long, extra special holiday weekend. Let’s get into the details. Thursday L’s next-to-last day of middle school. She begged us to host the annual 8th grade pool party. After weeks of badgering us we relented. Not sure I would have said yes if her class was bigger, but only 28 kids seemed manageable. Everyone was well-behaved, they all got picked up on time, and I felt bad for secretly hoping it would storm and cancel the event.
I planned on taking this week’s playlist one direction, then some things happened in the music world, I realized it was a holiday weekend, and we ended our academic year, so I decided to mix things up. open.spotify.com/playlist/… “Lay Low” - My Morning Jacket I watched a documentary on MMJ’s 2004 Bonnaroo performance the other night. Which means I spent the next hour listening to some of their best tracks. This seems like a good song to open any playlist with.