Our word of the week...

Gentrification...

Pronunciation[jen-truh-fi-key-shuhn] Pronunciation Key- Show IPA Pronunciation
-noun
1. the buying and renovation of houses and stores in deteriorated urban neighborhoods by upper- or middle-income families or individuals, thus improving property values but often displacing low-income families and small businesses.

what's spinning out of the headphones...

I am a lucky man...

Ahh...

all aTwitter...

with all the innernet noise going on about Twitter, I thought this apropos...I can't help but think about this every time I use it...

dark skies...

even after over 20 years...I'm still not used to the clouds reaching down and ripping up the earth...

Well earned...

Mission accomplished...

Plant shopping...

the Times...missing the forest for the trees...

i just worked 60 hrs over the last 4 days...so I'm a little late to the party on this one...i just can not let it pass without comment...Saturday, the Times published a piece speculating...if not Hillary, then, who could be the first female president of the United States...listing the qualities and background that they...the writer and editors of the NY Times...deem as necessary prerequisites for candidacy...and then they toss in a list of 12 women...with varied qualifications...who could be the next to run...Chelsea Clinton...really...?...

of course they overlooked the kind of candidate they would never take seriously...a war veteran...serious, ambitious, women are serving and fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq today...and I'm confident that any one of them with the desire to step into politics would have no problem overcoming what the Times calls..."the burden...to prove toughness..."

this is the New York Times blindspot...that any woman in uniform today...could be faithful to the mission...and not be George Bush in a pantsuit...it's completely conceivable that some present/former aviator...or intelligence officer...whathaveyou...could come home, run for...and win...state senate/governor/congress...and...with the right message...become a serious presidential candidate...I could vote for someone like that...

according to the NY Times...this is next to impossible...the same could have been said of a young state legislator from Illinois a few years ago...

Spliced Krispies...blowin' your mind...

if you are reading this...let's pretend that you are...you probably already know about mr mark vidler and his go home productions...and you already know that he dropped a new mashup album last week...music and technology being what they are today...nearly anyone can take two songs and throw them together...like anything else...it's all about talent...well, not really, but in this case...absolutely...mashup music...when it's done well...can blast your preconceived ideas about music out of the last century...

case in point:


right out of the gate this sounds like a shaky proposition...mr smooove soul meets the original angry emo boy...but somehow it works...somehow...these two songs...you've probably caught yourself absentmindedly humming at least one of them...start to make sense together...not only that...they start to...not make sense...without each other...maybe it's just me...but check out my favorite tracks...and then maybe download some for yourself...do it soon...they might not stay up very long...

a thin line between funny...and crap...

recently i found myself trying to explain to ms scribe the difference between this:


and this:


strictly speaking...they are both parodies that trade in stereotypes...for ms scribe, that's all there is to say about them...

going beyond matters of taste...i think there's more to it than that...one seems to wallow in negative stereotype...the other seems to point out how silly stereotypes are...i'm just sayin'...

Son of Rambow...a review...

ms scribe & i went to see a preview of Son of Rambow last night...wonderful movie...funny, insightful, well made all around...but let's get this out of the way up front...it's sweet...it's cute...but not disney saccharine sweet, and not too cute...disney would never make a movie like this...it's got promiscuous pre-teen french kissing...the rejection of religious piety...and criminal acts by minors...the fellas of hammer & tongs...get great performances out of their cast, and deftly balance child like wonder in a believable adult world...this is one of the big differences between a children's movie and a movie about children...more importantly, they really capture the the essence of imaginative youth...who would have thought we could look back at the 80's as a time of innocence...

so, yeah, we liked it and recommend it to everyone...

what would HST say...

last night...as i watched HRC choose to trod on...i missed HST and what he might think about this year's presidential race...he was, after all, an admitted political junkie...he had witnessed the most insane elections of the modern age...and was never without some wild eyed, left field observation...that bring clarity to the situation...