Author: Ga2so

  • 50ish Recent Songs, and the Best Song of Today’s Ride

    50ish recent songs, mostly picked by my phone. About half of them were from today’s ride, where I decided to get a pinch flat AND whack my hand into a utility box.

    Oh, and I didn’t tighten the bolts on my new cleats enough, so one came loose. NEAT.

    Big Time – Peter Gabriel
    The Most Beautiful Girl (In The Room) – Flight of the Conchords
    I Heard It Through the Grapevine – Marvin Gaye

    The Girl Is Mine – Richard Cheese and Lounge Against the Machine – You haven’t heard this song until you’ve heard a lounge version with Stephen Hawking.

    Cartrouble, Pts. 1 & 2 [Original Album Version] – Adam and The Ants
    No Rain – Blind Melon

    Julie’s Been Working For The Drug Squad – The Clash

    Hot Hot Hot!!! – The Cure
    One Way Or Another – Blondie
    Everybody’s a Star (Starmaker) (mono mix) – The Kinks
    The District Sleeps Alone Tonight – The Postal Service
    Yew – BUHU
    Hard To Handle – The Black Crowes
    Bedlam – Elvis Costello And The Imposters
    Train In Vain – The Clash
    Birthday – The Beatles
    Pretty In Pink – The Psychedelic Furs
    Chicago (acoustic version) – Sufjan Stevens
    Three Car Jam – Minutemen

    Love Will Tear Us Apart – The Hot 8 Brass Band – presented in its original form as a New Orleans jazz band song.

    The Loved One – INXS
    Miracle Cure – The Who
    13 A Sky Blue Rhapsody – ccc – ill chemist
    Boys Don’t Cry – Grant Lee Phillips
    All You Ever Think About Is Sex [12″ Club Version] – Sparks
    It’s The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine) – R.E.M.
    Breakfast – Evolution Control Committee
    A Sight For Sore Eyes – Tom Waits

    American Tune – Paul Simon – Winner, Best Song of the Ride. I think Katherine knows this song.

    New Moon on Monday – Duran Duran
    Scarecrow – Beck
    Everybody’s Got Something To Hide Except Me And My Monkey – My Brightest Diamond
    Livin’ on a Prayer (Bon Jovi cover) (BL Rewind 2) – The Boat People
    Nusrath Fateh Ali Khan – Piya Re Piya Re (Remix)
    When I’m Sixty-Four – The Beatles
    Alina’s Place – Fredrik

    The Old Saloon – The Lonely Island – The most important song of a generation.

    Falling – Howard
    Where Do I Begin – The Chemical Brothers
    Little Miss S. – Edie Brickell & New Bohemians
    The Mighty Hercules – Johnny Nash
    Lucky #9 (video version) – The Moldy Peaches
    Poses – Kiki Pau
    Graceland – Paul Simon
    Abracadabra – Steve Miller Band
    Hammering In My Head – Garbage
    Same Changes – Sam Phillips
    Tomorrow Wendy – Andy Prieboy
    Transatlanticism – Death Cab For Cutie
    The Tracks Of My Tears – Smokey Robinson & The Miracles

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3K1vJ0r0ax0
    Hombre Secreto (Secret Agent Man) – Plugz – I used to play the hell out of this soundtrack.

    Today’s ride. I actually had a short second ride, but it was slow and silly.

  • The three best songs of today’s ride

    I had to try out my new shoes, so I did my usual loop around Balboa Park. It was a good ride. One sign of a good ride is a moment where I think “this is a really good bike song.” Today there were three. In order from least to most good (today):

    They Might Be Giants: Istanbul (Not Constantinople)

    Brian’s favorite band. Their cover is much perkier than the original version.

    The Jam – Town Called Malice

    A great song that Weezer casually stole and made happy, it would have been number one if not for the last song of the ride…

    The Dead Milkmen – Punk Rock Girl

    Oh, this song. It would never make any top ten list of mine, but it sure feels good when you’re on the last half mile and you want a little push.

    Today’s ride:

  • New Shoes

    My bike shoes are three and a half years old. They were fine- biking is not exactly tough on the soles- but I needed a second pair for work. Of course, as soon as I ordered the new pair, the old pair started falling apart. THEY KNEW.

    My bike shoes.
    Left: old and busted.
    Right: New Hotness.
    In the back: gloves (in case you need to dye your hair).

    The new ones look more like sneakers, which is nice. They also look more like clown shoes, which might be okay as well. BONUS! One of my bikes is yellow, and the other is olive green. my feet will match either bike, which is what makes bikes fast.

    Leo from Twin Peaks would be so happy.

    I was going to put a video of Leo saying “new shoes,” but he’s gross and drooly., so you get some Angelo Badalamenti instead.
    Leo is excited.
    I told you he’d be happy.

  • My fingers didn’t like this ride

    I ride a lot in the summer. I’m used to heat. I ride wearing gym shorts and a t-shirt.

    Today was not hot: Sunny, but mid forties to low fifties. Not the best weather for thin shorts. I did adjust my clothing a tiny bit: I wore a long sleeved shirt. That helped my arms, but did nothing for my fingers or ears, which were mad at me for most of the ride.

    Tomorrow: gloves!

  • I make important things.

    Sometimes a dumb idea appears and must be indulged.

  • Please enjoy some bad writing about sex

    Bad sex in fiction: read extracts from the 2019 shortlist

    Don’t write like this. If you do write like this, don’t send it to a publisher. It’s creepy, embarrassing, and hilarious. You could be doing much more valuable things, like finally cleaning out that space under the kitchen sink or taking a really good nap.

    Also: don’t publish writing like this. That’s paper that could be still be trees. Instead it’s a permanent record of a complete lack of understanding of composition, physical intimacy, and basic anatomy.

    I changed my mind. Publish all writing like this. It accidentally brings the reader satisfaction. I hope that’s not a parallel to anything in the authors’ lives.

  • Today’s Silly Little Ride

    I thought the hardest part of riding every street in the San Fernando Valley would be the long stretches, but so far it’s the back-and-forth required to get every side street and alley.

    I’m sure once I start getting up into the hills I’ll wish I was doing twisty flat rides again.

    Today’s goofy ride:

    You can see my total progress here: https://www.strava.com/athletes/1133075/heatmaps/3eaec873#12/34.22072/-118.47229

  • 50ish Recent Songs

    50ish recent songs, mostly chosen by my phone. BONUS: a link to a full length feature film! Not a good film, but still: film!

    Distant Sky – Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
    Gerson’s Whistle – Yeasayer

    I Should Have Known Better – She & Him

    Remember that time you wanted a folky cover of a Beatles song done by Zoe Deschanel? Well, here it is!

    America – Simon and Garfunkel
    …Something Like That – Airline Food
    The Coast – Paul Simon
    Sa Trincha – Smell of Paradise
    Feed me to the Lions – Adam and The Ants

    I’m Not There – Sonic Youth

    Because when you think “Sonic Youth” you immediately think “Bob Dylan covers.”

    Concerto in A – Sicilienne – Telemann
    Harm – The Munitors
    Catch The Rainbow – Tokyo Ska Paradise Orchestra

    It’s Too Quiet – John Frost
    This is actually a New Detective sketch from KROQ. I used to love these, but now the silly fun is muted by the casual racism of “Socky, the little foreign office boy.”

    Reckless – Liam Finn
    Hot Car – Being Dead
    The Greys – Frightened Rabbit

    Israel – Miles Davis

    Y’like JAZZ?

    Baby Hallelujah – Konradsen
    The Balance – Royal Tongues
    Naima (alternate take) – John Coltrane
    The Loved Ones – Elvis Costello and the Attractions

    Van Morrison – U.T.A. Texas Hall – Dec 13, 1973 – Radio Commercial
    I have a bunch of these old commercials. I love hearing stuff like “Come see Van Morrison. Tickets are five bucks at the door.”

    Class System (featuring Pharrell Wiliams & Julee Cruise) – Handsome Boy Modeling School
    Catch 22 – Send Dudes
    Born to Run – Bruce Springsteen
    Love Will Tear Us Apart – Joy Division
    Know Your Rights – The Clash

    Our Lips Are Sealed – The Go-Go’s

    My first time watching this video is the official starting point of my Jane Wiedlin crush.

    Tired Eyes – Neil Young
    Best Friend – The Beat
    Sugar Daddy – Frank Black
    Everybody Knows (Ft. Mating Ritual) – RAEKO
    Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots Pt. 1 – The Flaming Lips
    Can’t Let Go – Lucinda Williams
    Fill the Void – Oingo Boingo
    Traits De Caractere – Paris Combo

    These Burgers (live ’01) – The Moldy Peaches

    Great song, or greatest song?

    Late For The Sky – Jackson Browne
    Changes – David Bowie
    True Love Will Find You In The End – Beck
    The Last Ten Homes – Mice Parade
    My Funny Valentine – Ben Webster
    Movie Theme – John Wesley Harding
    Little Green Bag – George Baker Selection
    We Live So Fast – Heaven 17
    Steven Stills – Poco – Tarrant C. C. C. – Jul 15, 1975 – Rock Show Commercial

    Triple Terror Show ad 2 – Commercial

    This is an ad for three grindhouse films: Blood of Ghastly Horror, Naked Evil, and The Gorilla Gang. Youtube actually has the full movie of Blood of Ghastly Horror. If that’s too much time to invest in a crappy film, at least watch the trailer for Gorilla Gang. It’s magical.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6x-LCuqiNM
    The full ding-dong movie!
    “Evilcolor” appears to be the same as “Black and White.”
    I think this really happened.

    The Distance – Cake
    Fleetwood Mac – Kansas – Memorial Aud. – May 19, 1975 – Rock Show Commercial
    Try – Delta 5
    Walkinonit – J Dilla
    Sweet And Lovely – Thelonious Monk Quartet with John Coltrane
    Sunday – The Cranberries

  • I make important things for work (Star Wars Edition)

    My students are shooting a film that includes a light saber battle, so I found a tutorial to help them figure out the effects. This is my rough test footage.

    George Lucas named Luke Skywalker after me.

    Some things:

    • Rotoscoping is annoying and tedious.
    • Rotoscoping is even more annoying and tedious when you realize halfway through it that you haven’t been setting keyframes.
    • It’s easier to to animate large movements.
    • It’s hard to match up prerecorded light saber sounds to new video. None of the sounds in this clip are timed properly, and most of them are the wrong sound altogether. I would have faked it with mouth noises, but Katherine is asleep and doesn’t need to wake up to me making buzzes and space burps.
    • Square ended light sabers look weird.

    I also made this opening for the morning bulletin. A few nerds on campus will get it.

    And all of them will be annoyed by it.

  • Some Bike Ridin’ Stuff

    Managed to get in a nice 26ish mile ride today at (for me) a good pace. If I get back to riding more than once a week, I might get okay at this again!

    I should get back to my “ride every street in the San Fernando Valley” project. I’ve got the Southeast corner pretty well sewn up. The hard part about the rest of it is I have to either drive my bike somewhere else (which I hate), or I have to re-ride for a while on streets I’ve already done (which will take longer).

    The map so far. I might be ten percent done. Maybe.

    Also, completely by accident, I found a great old bike song. This is a “new” (circa 1978) version by R. Crumb and the Cheap Suit Serenaders.

    Weird comics AND old music. What a renaissance man.
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