Saturday, November 28, 2009

10,000!

When I loaded some podcasts this morning, my iPod hit a milestone - 10,000 titles.


Unlike the way iTunes displays the count, I say “titles” because not every selection is a song.  I constantly cycle through a bunch of podcasts and have a few comedy albums in inventory.  Taking out the spoken-word titles, I still have 9903 songs on the unit.  That's quite a few.  Don't immediately draw a conclusion that that amount is too many - except for a few dozen new songs I'm trying out, I still like all the tunes and can identify most of them using the old “Name That Tune” starting point of seven notes.  We all have our own idea of how much music is just right.

Including the podcasts and comedy recordings, iTunes says it would take 28 days, 16 hours, 11 minutes and nine seconds to listen to the whole kit & caboodle.

I've already listened to nine podcasts today so the total is back below 10,000, but for a brief period, much like the stock market, I could say I was at a totally arbitrary and meaningless - yet cool - point.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

What Are These People Thinking?

Wait, wait, don't tell me. I really don't want to know.

After spending a delightful day chauffeuring my elderly parents out to the farm and back for a Thanksgiving lunch, I headed home. Traveling down 494 in Bloomington at 7:17PM, what did I see?

A line of 30-40 people at the door to Best Buy. Yes, a store that opens its doors tomorrow morning at 4:00AM.  7:17PM people.

Black Friday shopping is in and of itself nuts. But lining up to go to Best Buy nine hours or more before it opens? That's just crazy.

Monday, November 23, 2009

Big Bang Theory

Tonight's Big Bang Theory was not only one of the funniest episodes of a show that is consistently very funny, it contained the intersection of three of my favorite things:

Science Friday on National Public Radio;
Starbuck from Battlestar Galactica;
the word Exothermic.

Yes, in my life, it's the simple pleasures.

Sunday, November 22, 2009

It's No Goldwing


My new bike. I bought it a few weeks ago, just in time to put it into storage for the Winter. I plan on giving it a lot of use next season and a few seasons after that. Until then, I'm tripping over it in my garage.

No, it won't be replacing the Goldwing.

Somebody Had a Good Time Last Night

Up until the millisecond where it stopped being fun. I found this wreck as I was returning from the store this morning. It's on my street, about 2/10ths of a mile from my house.  I don't recognize the car - it could be a neighbor's or carrying a neighbor. Both airbags deployed. They were moving pretty fast at the time of impact, especially since they were 50 feet from a T-intersection. They were headed for trouble one way or another.

I talked to the neighbor who belongs to the front yard where the car came to rest. She didn't hear anything last night. She could be a drunk for all I know, so let's assume there was some noise at the moment of impact and probably some ambulance and constabulary noises. Doesn't look like there would have been any tire screeching, though - no skid marks. I think the driver's window was down intentionally, as there is no broken glass.

That's a funny place to park a car.

The fact there is no water in this photograph is a testament to the strength of the fire hydrants in Minnetonka.



The passenger airbag broke the the windshield and knocked the rear-view mirror loose.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

1000 and Still Dropping

My quest to listen to every song in my music collection is progressing nicely. Over the weekend the number remaining dropped below 1000. At the time I ran a new calculation to project when I'll hit zero and it came out as December 3, same as when I calculated on October 29. I must have picked up the pace the last couple of days as I'm down to 725 today and the new projection is December 1. Maybe with the holiday weekend in there, I might increase my burn rate even further and hit zero in late November.

Hey, it's my hobby. I don't care if I'm boring you.

The odds of who will play the last song have shifted since the last post. The artist with most songs remaining is...Kathy Mattea. Hey, where have I heard that name recently? Chicago, Debbie Gibson, Toto, the Eagles and Kylie Minogue are a little behind. Most of the remaining artists have only one or two songs left in the unplayed list.

I'm afraid “One (is the Loneliest Number)” by Three Dog Night has already played but it would be real cool if that had turned out to be the final song.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Kathy Mattea

This is weird. I'm sitting here writing my movie blog and listening to music. "Summer of My Dreams" by Kathy Mattea comes on and I think, "I've got a date with her this weekend." I actually do. She's doing a concert with the Minnesota Orchestra on Saturday and playing a regular show on Sunday. I have tickets to both.

Then my phone beeps. It's a voice mail from Orchestra Hall saying that the KM shows are postponed due to illness. Postponed to next June. Wow. Shocking news.

Wait. I was listening to Kathy Mattea sing about Summer while I was daydreaming about her concerts and I get a message saying the concerts are postponed until Summer. My imagination is not so good that I could make this stuff up.