Kevin->Write(thoughts, browser, time)

So we went to Chicago this weekend, Alison Jeanne and I did, and I have observations.

1) Driving. People drive like idiots there. I saw more near-misses there than I do in a month in St. Louis. Also, it's contagious: Alison noted that I myself was driving more aggressively than usual. Part of this was an attempt to not look like the nancyboy shitkicker that my Missouri tags proclaim me to be, but part of it was survival. Survival, I say! Anyway, use public transport.

2) Public Transportation. It's really nice up there. We have a train here, but it's inconvenient and slow, particularly since where we live is already close to everywhere the train goes. I wanna live in a place where I don't have to get in my car for a week at a time.

3) Heft. Chicago feels like a big city in a way that Columbus and St. Louis and even Philadelphia just don't. I've never been to New York or L.A., so I'm about as unqualified to make this statement as anyone you can think of, but Chicago: big damn city.

4) Art Institute. I'm not a visual arts person, but I really liked the Art Institute. We spent about three hours there and it wasn't quite enough. One thing that I don't like about having been there is that there are a lot of famous works there, so people ask, "Oh! Did you see the X? What about the Y?" and I'm all like, "Yes, yes I did see X and Y. Amazingly enough, they looked pretty much like the prints." I want to talk about things like how Renoir did lots of paintings of women, and they all look the same, and who the hell was it that he was painting over and over again, anyway? Also, I have this thing where I have to read all the text about the art before I even look at it, so I'm reading all about like where Picasso studied during 1938 and what the colors and textures mean before I even look at the painting. I hate this but I can't help it. I like words. Also, Alison's roommate sat on a piece of art the last time that she was there. It was not a Renoir woman. Long story long: Make it a stop on your next visit.

5) Soccer Game. Ostensibly, we were in town to see USA v. England, men's national sides, for the first time since 1994. The game was a disappointment. In cold and rainy lake weather, American fans were outnumbered by English fans by a slight margin and outvocalled by a massive margin. USA were losers and played without verve. Both sides looked lethargic. The level of play was not befitting two of the top ten teams in the world.

6) LN's boyfriend. He is extremely tall, tall enough to make me feel like a nancyboy (again), and is called "Chris." We liked him. Bravo, LN!

7) Chicago style hot dogs. Tomato, hot peppers, onions, mustard, relish, other things. Yum.

That's all for now. I'm nearly finished with three books, so book posts coming shortly.

Finished 5/21/2005. #76 on the Modern Library Top 100. This book is interesting in large part because a co-worker of mine knew Muriel Spark slightly. He said that she was very "precocious." This book is sort of precocious, but what it wasn't was real great. It is a short and quick read, though, so I went ahead and finished. Miss Brodie is a semi-quirky teacher who handpicks a group of six girls to be in her posse, and basically everyone else resents it, except for the men who want to sleep with Miss Brodie and the girls. In the end, one of the girls gets her fired for being a Fascist for reasons that are unclear to me. It isn't the one you'd expect, Spark goes to pains to let us know, but really you wouldn't expect it from any of them; they are indistinguishable except in their extreme characteristics-one is an actor, one is good at sex, one is dumb, one is athletic, etc. The final third of the book revolves around the affair that never was between Brodie and the married art teacher; he summons the girls to sit for portraits in turn but the paintings and drawings all come out looking like Brodie, which is revealing. The girls don't have fully developed personalities-they are each Miss Brodie with that one exaggerated characteristic, which is sort of nice but for when they have to actually come across as real people. I believe that we are supposed to sympathize with the group for being slightly less affectedly insincere and pretentious than their mid-20th century British girls school surroundings, so I suppose I'll go ahead and sympathize away. All in all, I'd rather have been watching an NBA playoff game, but only if it went to the wire and the team I was cheering for won.*

Note: Upon writing the last sentence, I suddenly hate everything about this post, but I'll let it stand for posterity.

From two Wednesdays ago to last Wednesday, I purchased six new CDs, setting a personal record for a weeks time(I think). Presented in reverse order of goodness, with two sentences for each. Yes, I still buy CDs. I never liked stealing music, and I don't like iTunes because I like tangible products in exchange for my hard earned dollars. Also I have no internet connection.

The Velvet Underground and Nico, The Velvet Underground. Sixth place finish is more an indication of the strength of the competition than an indictment of the music. I knew and loved Heroin already; several other strong tracks but although I understand how it became so influential, there just isn't much here that moves me.
Guero, Beck. I never really got Beck and I still don't, with yet another installment of nattering inscrutable lyrics and off-key whitey yammering. I want beautiful melodies or I want hard driving beats, and Beck always gives me warm oatmeal. (Rule Breaking Third Sentence Alert!) Where It's At is a truly awesome song and everyone wants to have his babies so I keep giving him chances.
The Beautiful Struggle, Talib Kweli. I actually bought this last fall when it came out, but those fucking fuckers stole it when they took my stereo in February and I hadn't ripped mp3s because it never really made it out of the car as it rocks my world. Not as strong as the 2002 solo debut Quality-overproduced like Black Eyed Peas on Elephunk-but I paid cash for it twice.
Original Pirate Material, The Streets. I've never heard anything quite like this before; I love how he doesn't hustle through his delivery like every MC in the colonies. He has a real gift for weaving multiple rhymes through his phrasing a la Chali2na of Jurassic 5("...we sloppy dope and I'm hoping what I wrote get you open like a fallopian tube, in my crew we include...").
Songs for Silverman, Ben Folds. It's a Ben Folds album. I bought it and listened to it sixty times. 8/11/05 at PromoWest?
Make Believe, Weezer. Simply the best Weezer album yet. Mature, developed songs without losing the humor or pep.

Folks, I crushed the comments. There are blogs that need comments and blogs that don't...mine doesn't. Also, I get no traffic, especially anymore. Also, the little comment zeros made me sad. Also, I updated the template*. So, I apologize if you arrived here desperate for some hot, wet comment action, you perv, but you'll have to get your fix elsewhere. Real post to follow immediately.

*By "update the template," I of course meant "picked new blogger template with updated CSS and conditional tags and blah blah," not "did actual programming work." The reason for this is about 60 percent ineptitude and 40 percent sloth. I haven't made a real website since HTML 4.0 was the bee's knees and I don't feel like learning anything new, especially relating to damn programming. I was trying to make a random number generator in java the other day and failing, for gods sake. Anyway, I'm obviously torn up about this deep down to spend as much time as I have defending myself, so I'd appreciate it if you left me a little pick me up in the comment section.

Seriously, I dare you. Leave me a comment. Just stick a little post it on the screen or something.

Finished 5/8/2005. Clearly and cleverly written history of the stock market coupled with explanations of why beating the market is impossible to do consistently. Consequently, the most sound investment strategy is a broad, diverse portfolio that you don't screw around with, which will grow at market rate in the long term without transaction fees cutting into profits. I estimate that I only understood 70 percent of the material, but I think it was the essential 70 percent. Interesting and informative, and totally unspiritually moving, to the degree that I'm yawning while I write about it. ZZZZ.

Get it here. "I don't get that much radio. I don't sell that many records, and my music's extremely accessible. So it puts me in a weird position as far as the press goes. There's no story. I don't know. I'm not that damn good-looking. So there you go."

~Ben Folds on being a has been, from The Onion interview (here).