It’s been one of those weeks, so far. Nothing big going on, but lots of little things. Each time I pause and think, “I should really post something to Ye Olde Website,” I either don’t have time to sit down and focus or I’m at a loss for topics. Thus time for a reader-favorite D’s Notes posts! GHWB Four years can be a lifetime when you’re young. When George Bush was elected as president in 1988, I was 17 and unable to vote.
November 30. This is when my music listening patterns begin to change. I’ve been listening to some Christmas music, but not as much I have in the past. I think I’m waiting for December 1 to really dive in. This week has been largely devoted to rounding out my Favorite Songs of the Year list. But more about than in a couple weeks. For now, some new music is still rolling in, but the pace has certainly slowed.
Chart Week: November 15, 1986 Song: “Human” - The Human League Chart Position: #2, 10th week on the chart. Peaked at #1 the week of November 22. I only got to listen to a few minutes of the local countdown two Sundays ago. I felt obligated, though, to write about it as that was the last old AT40 we will get here in Indy this year. The station that airs AT40 replays switched to Christmas music on Thanksgiving, and will be airing the special holiday editions of AT40 for the next month.
Our Thanksgiving weekend was, by one measure, perfect. We were intensely busy for parts of the weekend. At others we sat around and did nothing. Every long, holiday weekend should have that balance. C and I went to watch some of her classmates play for the CYO girls basketball city championship Tuesday night. They lost, handily, but C had fun watching them. Wednesday I snuck a trip into Costco before our builders sent some guys over to wrap up the final thing they still needed to fix.
A few days later than normal, but my annual public service announcement on where to find the most complete schedule of the holiday shows over the next month. 2018 Christmas TV Schedule
OK, this is one of those little things that, if you did not know it, will absolutely blow your mind. It sure did mine. Mostly because it seems achingly obvious yet it isn’t something I had ever thought of, nor had I heard someone else talk about it. I’ve even had relatives live in Australia and they never pointed this out. The Moon Is Flipped Upside Down in the Southern Hemisphere
Our Thanksgiving week got off to a great start. Monday M learned she had been accepted to attend Cathedral High School for the next four years. S and I got an email around noon, which I forwarded to M’s account. When she got into the car after school I told her to check her email. She had a moment of confusion, because like most kids her age email is about the last method of communication she would ever use.
Blowing My Cover: My Life As a CIA Spy - Lindsay Moran I found this book while doing some research on DB John, whose tremendous Star of the North I read earlier this fall. It was on a list of some of his favorite espionage books, and thus seemed worth the read. I did not enjoy it as much as John did. This is Moran’s recounting of her experience as a CIA agent in the late 90s and early 00s, from recruitment through training to becoming an active field agent.
It happened! Really, I thought somehow, someway, the deal would get screwed up. Another, better, bigger deal would come along. Or there would be complications ending his previous contract. Or he would just decide he didn’t want to coach again. Yet here we are with Les Miles as the new KU football coach! That along with Pooka Williams going wild in Norman Saturday night combined to make this the biggest, most exciting weekend for KU football since the 2008 Missouri game.
Not exactly the most promising start to the 2019 winter season. Yesterday morning we had an ice storm roll in at just the wrong/perfect time (depending on your perspective) and had a snow day because the roads were just bad enough to force our principal’s hand. We went four years without a snow day; now we’ve had two this calendar year and the earliest one in the season since M started kindergarten.
A few quick football thoughts. KU The Sisyphean rite that is the changing of football coaches at the University of Kansas continues. David Beaty, a truly decent but woefully under qualified man, got the ax a week ago. The timing seemed a little strange given KU had just knocked off TCU two weeks earlier. But things never really make much sense around KU football. If there were any doubts about Beaty’s ability to handle the job, those were removed last Saturday as the Jayhawks lost a thoroughly winnable game against Kansas State.
After starting cross country practice back in mid-July, we are finally free of kid sports for awhile. L’s basketball season came to a rather dreadful end Sunday in the City semifinals. Although the result was not a surprise, the way we got there was a bit of a shock. We were playing the team that gave us our only loss of the regular season. We lost that game by 16 after being down by just two at halftime.
Chart Week: November 3, 1984 Song: “Penny Lover” - Lionel Richie Chart Position: #18, 5th week on the chart. Peaked at #8 for two weeks in December. Usually these entries are about great songs, forgotten songs, or just songs that have some kind of special meaning to me. This week is a little different: this song was selected purely for interesting trivia reasons. I’ve always considered very late 1982 through mid–1985 the peak of 1980s music.
I wish I understood how Spotify works with Wordpress. Some weeks, after I put these posts up, I’ll check them and get an error on in my browser window that Spotify can’t load. I’ll check it in a different browser and it works fine. So I don’t know if you all are running into the same issues, or if it is something on my end (I’ve checked to make sure it’s not my ad-blocker).
College hoops is here! And it kicked off in a big way for those of is who are in Indianapolis. I did not plan on going to the Champions Classic. I have a couple acquaintances who I know could have easily gotten me decent seats. But L’s city basketball tournament was starting last night, at the exact same time as the KU-Michigan State game, so I decided to be a good dad and stick with her.
The World As It Is - Ben Rhodes This memoir by the former speechwriter and national security aide to President Obama has been on my list since it came out earlier this year. I had heard good things in several places about it. But I was not sure if I was ready to re-live the Obama years, or if I wanted to read anything about politics for that matter. I had profoundly different reactions to the book.
Chart Week: October 13, 1984 Song: “Strut” - Sheena Easton Chart Position: #31, 8th week on the chart. Peaked at #7 the week of November 24. To me, at least, it seems like Sheena Easton’s career was longer than it actually was. She exploded onto the scene in 1981 with the world-wide smash “9 to 5 (Morning Train),” which went to #1 in four countries and was top 10 in four others.
We’ll start with a playlist. If all goes well, I’ll have a video for you later in the day. open.spotify.com/user/224a… “Rain Check” - Carl Broemel. I’m not sure if I totally missed Indy native Broemel’s new album earlier this year, or if I listened to it and it just didn’t connect. I’m guessing it is more option A because this song rocks and I’m sure I would not have ignored it had I heard.
I mentioned some time after our move last summer that we were all having a hard time making the small adjustments that come with a new home. Where are the cooking pots? Where are the cutting boards? Where is our stash of paper towels? Etc, etc etc. The longer we’ve been in this house, the more all of that newness has become routine. What continues to be strange, though, are the seasonal things we did in the old house and how to bring them to the new house.
I’m sure several of my loyal readers have been anticipating this post. So, finally, here are some disjointed thoughts on college hoops, shoe companies, and the FBI. It’s been a crazy ass few weeks for college basketball in general, and KU basketball in particular. The first of several trials that resulted from the FBI investigation into shoe companies and agents allegedly defrauding universities featured KU at the center. When the trial began, I was hoping that nothing worse that what we already knew about KU’s ties to the case would come out.