Shove it, brother, just keep walking

I have just discovered that iTunes, the service, is pretty cool. As an audio player, I'm not as keen on it as Windows Media Player. There are a few little details the one does better than the other. Also, my version at work doesn't like CDs too much. They play fine, but if I leave a disc in too long without ejecting it, or keep pause on too long, the disc starts skipping for no good reason and I have to restart my computer. But the music downloading part, on the other hand, is pretty cool. It's very handy for a case of "well, I like that song, but I don't want the whole album."

My list so far:

"Ooh La La"--the Ditty Bops
"Decent Days and Nights"--the Futureheads
"Just Keep Walking"--INXS
"Mansized Rooster"--Supergrass
"Lady With the Spinning Head"--U2

So I have a blugrass combo, two British bands, an Irish band, and an Australian group. Nice and diverse, I think.

I must exercise caution, since it's so easy to download a song. Point, click, hey! Only $1! Gotta keep an eye out though, or those dollars could add up in a hurry. Good thing I'm off work next week.

Thanks to Janice "Eagle Eyes" Koziatek I now have my own copy of Godzilla: Save the Earth for the PS2. I can go about being even nerdier than usual now.

Have I mentioned I can identify any critter from a Godzilla movie based solely on the noise it makes?



Let's talk kids for a moment. I think they're quite fine. Cute, even. I wouldn't mind having some one of these days. But in my line of work, they can be a bit of a drag. Shooting for the Nor Co Journal, they just eat that stuff up. want to get something published? Just send them a picture of a cute kid and you're in. Annual Report here at Ye Olde Library? Let's get as many cute kids as possible! It'll appeal to the suits! (Note: I highly doubt anyone, save for our auditors, really do anything with the AR. And they skip right to the hard data) I think all of the stuff I shoot at work falls into two categories; author visits and cute kids.

Aside: I have just been told I'll be shooting an 80-year old volunteer for a poster we're going to be doing. He speaks like 5 languages and translates materials for our Special Collections department.

Kids: it's kinda easy then to fall back and just go with what the people want. The trick then, is to keep myself sharp and try to shoot something that isn't cute, precocious kids, especially with the Journal. What good is my portfolio if I have a majority of kid pictures? My new rule is to only shoot kids if the opportunity is too good to pass up. With the library, it's hard to avoid, since we have so many kids' programs. I just have to deal with it. And, as my boss pointed out, "for someone who generally eschews shooting kids, you've got a knack for it." So it'd be silly not to play to a strength. I just can't let myself get lazy. Look for fresh angles and new ideas.

It doesn't come up much round here, but the Cardinals are really good. If I were better at writing about sports I might discuss it more often, but I can't get into it much. I did attend my first game of the season last night, a 7-1 triumph over the BoSox. Complete game by MattyMo, excellent defense by Grudz, a suicide squeeze, and some timely hitting from the bottom of the order. Most amusing moment: the scoreboard showed a news item that "Prior to the game, the Cardinals disabled Roger Cedeno." I know he's been a bit off (read: pretty awful) this year, but man, did the team have to go to such extremes? Did they hire a hit-man to come and break Rog's kneecaps? I give Cedeno a lot of crap for sucking, but I'm more than willing to eat some grilled crow if he comes back and starts performing.

It was interesting, at one point, watching David "I'm Such a Jett" Eckstein slide into third with a two-run triple. In the Grand Scheme of Things, what happens on that field doesn't matter. A bunch of guys get paid $many to play a kids' game, and for some reason, we like to watch. Maybe it's some sort of "community" thing. Or not. I don't know, really. And yet, I realized I don't care. I do know, though, that I was happy to be there watching the Home Team win.



Rooster!
Dave