My life as music montage

There is a lot of magic packed into that little silver iPod mini of mine. Those 900 songs don't hurt. The fact that I can block out cell phone conversations and other noise pollution isn't so bad either. The sheer value I now get for my music can't go unmentioned. Making my own playlists is kind of fun. Despite all of these fine reasons for enjoying my mini, I've been waiting for that moment when my life would be a musical montage. For more than six months now this has proven more elusive than I thought possible. Somehow the combination of my somewhat melancholy-leaning musical tastes and my tendency to be walking to or from work or sitting on the Metro just weren't jiving.

Today, on my way home from work all of that changed. Rather yesterday, while shopping for music all of that changed and then today my life as musical montage was finally blasted into my ears. It started on the Metro with a little Ozzy Ozborne as the sparks were flying and the sun had just set, "I'm going off the rails on a crazy train." Then as I was stuck in a crowd trying to wait patiently as we self-herded onto the escalator Real McCoy captured the moment, "Run Away. Run away. Run away if you want to survive." After I'd escaped the herd, good old Run-DMC suggested that I "walk this way." Which I did, all the way to the grocery store. Don't mind me, my fellow pedestrians. Once inside Safeway, the man tried to bring me down, but I wasn't having any of it. No. No. Not me. I was "Rockin' the Suburbs, just like Quiet Riot did."

There may have been a few other songs in there, but that was basically it. And it was beautiful. The first level of my iPod journey is complete. Don't judge me though, because, "Ya'll don't know what it's like, being male, middle class, and white."

(It all pretty much ended when Ben Folds continued on about "The Army" and then Missy Elliot tried to convince me to "Lose Control." I wasn't having any of it.)

Making out with cake
I like cake. I eat it for birthdays (when burritos don't catch on), for weddings, for the occasional here's-a-cake day at work, but I don't love cake. I didn't think I'd crave it on a spring night. I didn't expect to want it from a cake shop. Then last night, I tried CakeLove.

It's a cake place, like Cold Stone Creamery is an ice cream place. This CakeLove place has been a bit of a media darling around here. If memory serves (and it usually doesn't), this place was started by a lawyer that was fed up with practicing law and wanted to pursue his cake dreams. A bunch of hard work later and poof he starts this place. Fun, slightly cliched arc leads to dessert. As I was saying, I never thought I'd crave cake and need to stop at place like CakeLove, but it was next to Eggspectation (a whole other story) and new and open and so I tried it.

I ordered a slice of Razzamatazz, mostly for the name. It. was. delicious. It was so moist and chocolatey and raspberry-ey. I wanted to make out with it. I think I understand the name of the place now.

Back in your cocoon, social butterfly
No matter how hard I leaned on the wall, I was unable to disappear into it. I was in a beautiful space, high ceilings, multi-colored rooms. The wine and cheese set mixed with the spirits crowd. I mixed with almost no one, not even my fellow wallflower. The crowd undulated as the arrivers crossed paths with the departers. All around me conversation and alcohol seemed to flow smoothly in and out. No waves there. A few times I was able to insert a comment, but generally I had nothing to say about flex spending accounts, bourbon vs. whiskey, the Chinese Internet, or horror films. Admittedly, I never once asked anyone a question, but no questions came to mind. I never initiated the "Hi, I'm ..." handshake, because I knew that would require follow-up. Although, I'm not sure anyone actually followed up with me. Maybe they sensed my reluctance. Somehow during the evening my watch skipped an hour. I was glancing at my watch thinking, "it's 11:30, I could leave." Then I was informed that it was only 10:30. Time had slowed considerably. I did what anyone in this situation would do: I ate more cheese. It was tasty, but proved unmoving. So much for the power of cheese.

Duck! while I post in bi-polar
I'm ready to spew anger in all directions without a good reason. I'm not discriminating. This is not a happy place today. I have to write a job description and I hate describing what I do because that's admitting it. When I finish the job description I need to swipe some of those phrases and slap them on my resume. I don't like stealing and slapping either and I really don't like resumes. It's really not fun to try to quantify my contributions.

Meanwhile, my mini is starving for battery juice and the only song I like right now is I'm a cuckoo for obvious reasons (the beat and the line, "I'd like to see you. I had a funny dream and you were wearing funny shoes.")

Speaking of funny shoes, I got a pair in the mail. They're perfect. They're just like the pair of cleats I already have that isn't quite worn out. Now I've got two. Two. I guess I need two pairs of shoes because for the last 8 weeks I've been jumping three days a week. The result of all this jumping is that my calves are on fire and also ROCK HARD. (I don't know how that applies exactly. An extra shoe for each calf? Not sure.) Anyway, I thought all the jumping was going to make me jump higher, but so far I think the real benefit is in the jumping faster. It bothers me a little that this is my major accomplishment of late '05/early '06. Then again, if I don't injure anything, better jumping abilities are going to be pretty sweet.

Sweet like dining hall mint chocolate chip ice cream which somehow today did not have instant transformative powers. Perhaps it was because every time I looked up there were tiny 18-year-olds looking all innocent and unbathed. Then one asked me why if I had braved 4 years of college dining and now have a kitchen I wasn't using it. I had to explain about the side dishes, the banter, and the general lack of desire that comes with making a meal every night. This was more distressing than I had hoped it would be. Distressing like my throws in the wind and January's sudden interest in winter sans snow. And distressing like the identity of commenter R. R, Who are you? Are you the Ranger without the Lone? Are you Rambo? Rainbow Brite? RRRRRRRRRRR! I haven't had an arch nemisis in quite sometime. I might be due...

Ah, connection
The Internet was on the fritz. It wasn't so much fading in and out like a radio station on the edge of the listening area as it was generally not working. For a moment, I was panicked. I needed to check my email and make the rounds before bed. How could I sleep without it? I took a deep breath and realized that I would survive. At about that same moment or some 33 moments later, the announcement was made, "The Internet is working."

I lunged for my desk and fired up Safari. No email. The rounds only lead me to Meckhead's dress. Where else would the Internet lead but a bridesmaids' dress? I laughed at myself and went to sleep.

HOO HOO
Bring on the weddings. Or at least the receptions. I'm ready to dance! I couldn't keep my bowling-shod feet from tap-tap-tapping tonight. Admittedly, the bowling alley played its best music ever. It was a fantastic playlist. It was all I could do to stop dancing and bowl. If you dare call what I did "bowling." I need to get out and 2006 looks to be an excellent year for wedding receptions. I haven't received an invitation for any yet, but there are five weddings tentatively on my schedule and one other one that I'm hoping for.

If everybody is going to act like grown-ups and get married, at least I get to dance. Let's get it started, Ya.

Hungry Hungry Adulterers
It may have been hunger, but Match Point made me feel like I'd committed adultery. The movie was awkward; the actors seemed to be looking at the wrong things. I think it was well done, but it made me uncomfortable. It reminded me of Closer that way.

Attn: Rachel McAdams

Dear Rachel,

I'm not stalking you! I just wanted to make sure you and the rest of the Internets knew that. Somebody else told me about the Ultimate. Just out of curiosity, how often do you play?

Not important. Never mind. I'm not writing to clear my good name or find out about your Ultimate prowess. Well, if my good name happened to clear in the process and some Ultimate got discussed, well... No, I'm writing for another reason. I am writing to vouch for Briguy. He's a decent fellow, borderline hilarious, and relatively clean as far as I can tell. I don't want to get carried away in such a public forum, but I'm willing to put myself out there and say you could do much worse. I don't know this Gosling fellow from Zach Braff, but the two of you made me bawl like no other in The Notebook. I mean, the book made me cry, but the movie had me howling like a 6-year-old girl who'd just lost her puppy under the tires of a bus. Pink, puffy cheeks, oh it was just awful. Funny and awful. And endearing. Like Briguy, who I swear this letter is about. He's not awful. I just meant the funny and endearing part. Maybe. I don't know about the endearing. I'm suddenly not comfortable making that judgment, but if necessary I think I can find some females who would be willing to step up and certify that Briguy is endearing. He doesn't actually cook in that Zorro costume though, which, at least in my mind, has to knock him down a few points. I don't know how you feel about Zorro though. If you've taken to reading letters addressed to you on the Internets today, I suspect you've thought more about Zorro than ever. Unless you're really into Zorro and then I suppose it was probably a pretty normal day.

This may strike you as rather odd and I realize that you have no reason to believe me regarding Briguy's character, but you'll find that I do have a history of this sort of thing. Do you know Mandy Moore? Because I wrote a similar letter for my friend vouching for his character and now he's getting married. We're all very happy. It's too bad he never got a letter back from Mandy though. It was kind of rude. I'm sure you're not like that.

On second thought, I think I forgot to mail that letter. If you see Mandy, can you apologize for me? She could've found that something special, but I didn't have 37 cents and now that chance is gone. Thank goodness for blogs, so you don't have to suffer the same fate.

If the opportunity arises, might I suggest you enlist your sixth sense and give Briguy a call. He's better than fine caviar.

Thank you for your time,
David

P.S. I've never actually had fine caviar. Or any caviar. I once slaughtered some crabs with a friend of mine. I still feel kind of bad about that. I guess that's different though.

Framed, I tell you
The fun thing about shopping for glasses is that it's an opportunity for re-invention. With just a flick of the wrist and hundreds of dollars worth of plastic, I can be a mad scientist, or a hipster, or that Lennon guy, or some approximation of all three. I can be an intellectually cool Beatle-esque version of me.

Or I can continue the squashing of the big round circles that were my glasses in seventh grade. So I'm a squashed version of my seventh-grade self. Sounds about right. Which is why I'm going to wear contacts most of the time.

Things I learned on MLK day
By cursory reading, it appears that Iceland has a constitution and government similar to the United States. Iceland also has a population of about 300,000 people. That means the pick-up line there could be, "We've got a lot of work to do to catch up with the United States. Bring your friends." Or perhaps, "What else were you going to do during a 20-hour night?"

Unrelated to Iceland or pick-up lines, I also watched Rollergirls. From what I can gather, a bout consists of two timed halves in which women slam into each other while going round and round on skates. There's a jammer from each team skating through the mess of girls (ideally twice). When the jammer comes around the second time every opponent she passes is worth a point. When she passes all four opponents or gets clobbered, the point is over. I thought I heard something about no punching, but that seems to be a fairly flexible rule. I don't think I need to watch another episode, but the next time the roller derby is in town or I'm in town with a roller derby, I think I need to go. It seemed oddly compelling, and in ways reminded me of Ultimate.

Possibly the first serious post of '06
I'm currently struggling with right and wrong. The big things are usually pretty easy. Killing people- wrong. Rainbows- right. It's the speed limits where I struggle. Just because the governing body says it's right, that doesn't make it right. And just because the governing body says it's right, and has a really good reason for saying it's right, doesn't make it right. Despite the my occasional rebellious tendency, it doesn't make it wrong either.

Just malleable?

Compound this struggle by realizing that how I think effects how other people view this speed limit of a right and wrong. Does that change the rightness and wrongness? It shouldn't, but it sure makes me check my response.

Given the finger by the hands of fate
I should probably save that title, but then I'd have to use the arrow keys and stuff. I'll leave it up there instead.

Travelocity is offering a 3-day weekend special with low low fares and I was tempted. I decided maybe I would go on a little trip this weekend, but I didn't know where. So I rolled the dice, or more accurately closed my eyes and moved the mouse up and down and in a few swirling motions to choose my destination. Round and round and up and down, where I stop nobody- WASHINGTON D.C.

What?! Are you kidding?

I'm not flying there, I'll tell you that. I'm sure it's lovely this time of year, though.

I need a dental assistant
I have no idea who my dentist is. I don't mean he has a secret identity like Super Chloride Man and I just discovered it or that I thought he was good, but it turned out that he was evil in a Mr. Teeth/Dr. Cavity kind of way. I mean that I don't remember who he is or where to find him. The man has X-rayed my mouth and I can't remember his name. It seems blatantly disrespectful.

I'm trying to think up ways to find him. I could eat a whole lot of sweets while cruising the streets and see if he'd reveal himself. I could make dentist cold calls. "Excuse me. Do you have pictures of my teeth? Because I think I've lost one."
If he were a superhero, I could do something dastardly and force the mayor to shine a beacon into the sky in the shape of a bicuspid. Only we don't have a mayor, and I'm pretty sure he wasn't a superhero, just a dentist that cleaned criminals' teeth. It's coming back now...

Me in grateful damsel voice: Oh Internet! You've saved the day again.

Evil Memory Loss: This won't be the last you've seen of me.
(fading evil laughter)

Reveling in "so close"
I knew the disc was headed to the corner. The man I was covering was headed that way and he had me by a step. The throwers eyes lit up as she pivoted. She cocked back and fired a flick to his outside. I cut into the path and gave chase to the waist-high spinning disc. In that instant that I planted my feet, I had visions of making it "Dave food." I laid out, extending myself horizontally in the air, but I came up short. It was like my arms shrank in mid-air. I stood, mud splattered from my thighs to my chest, and trotted back down the field. Most of my day would go just like that. I seemed to be a step or two from the big play. I got dirty though. And I made the little plays. The right throws, the easy catches, the gnat-like defense were all working. It was 35 degrees. The sun was shining. The gloves were off and the disc was flying. If that's so close, I think I'll take it.

Takin' the blog back to its roots
The Chronic of Narnia is the funniest thing to come out of SNL since Jack Handey.

Laugh. It's good for you. (Note: The last link isn't funny except for the part where it says that a belly laugh is "an internal jogging." )

I have just resolved to write a post about internal jogging. I apologize in advance.

A pizza my mind
There's a certain mainstay pizza establishment that is currently advertising "A Pair Deal." The commercial has a bunch of twins delivering, not one, but two! pizzas to customers while a voice-over tells us about this wonderful deal. The voice tells us that when cashing in on this deal, we, the customer, get to choose two toppings (ooh! A theme!) and one of the establishment's many tasty crusts. I'm thinking, "Isn't that the way pizza is ordered?!?" Is choosing toppings and a crust really the strongest selling point this little hut has to offer? YES! It is and it's so amazing because with this deal, a person actually gets to go through this twice. Which reminds me a lot of ordering TWO pizzas, the same way it would be ordered anywhere else in the universe.

Incred-ible!!!!

And another thing
With no offense to the giver, Jelly Bellys are ridiculous. I like jelly beans, especially black ones, but most any jelly bean will do. Notice I say "most." Jelly Bellys are ridiculous. I've said it twice now, in case you're skimming. Don't think I didn't know you skimmed. I knew. We can still be online acquaintances, but don't go getting any other ideas there chief. There's a whole lot of wires and content to separate us and I think that's for the best. So, Jelly Bellys- Why? Why do they put in jelly beans that taste like the bottom of my shoe? Or hobo underarm? Why? I could go through and eat the beans individually, carefully identifying each on the back of the package, but that's annoying. I want handfuls. I want to reach into the bag, scoop out the contents, and pour jelly beans into my mouth like a savage jelly-bean-eating beast. For some reason Jelly Belly feels that my punishment for this savage behavior is eating tiny beans that taste like skunk mixed in with the fruit flavors. SKUNK! And not the good skunk either. Whenever I hit a bad jelly bean, I want to spit out the whole chunky rainbow-colored mess and wipe my tongue with steel wool. STEEL WOOL! I've taken to emphasizing things again. It's a little thing I picked up from Lewis Black. Too bad he does it better. Did I mention Jelly Bellys are ridiculous? And that we're still tight? Good.

In Vitro cinema
Ok. What's the deal with all the kids in the movies? Lemony Snicket has his series with those three unfortunate children. There's that run on Cheaper by the Dozen flicks. Then there's the same movie called Yours, Mine, Ours, Theirs? His? Hers? Who are these kids?! and now the one with the nanny that reminds me of Mary Poppins and the kid from Love Actually. What exactly is going on here? Is there a cinema baby boom? Are the Hollywood types so desperate that they are now trying to serve up family fare all the time? Kids are the new Schwarzenegger.

There's nothing on the Internets tonight, dear.

There used to be days and weeks of a "Winter Break" that it stretched on nearly as long as the snow was high. Oh, remember when there was snow? Remember how much I missed my friends over that long break? The agony of those days is gone, like the snow. Global warming/growing up the major contributing factors, not necessarily in that order. Weeks go by and I don't see my friends. I'm fine. I'm ok. I've got a nice bottle of Scotch, what do I need them for anyway? I miss them. Where are they? Wisconsin probably. Bastards. I didn't mean that. I'm sorry.

Let me tell you an embarrassing and not-all-together true story about my friends. They met on an island in the middle of the country. They were stranded after their paddle-boats wrecked during a nasty storm. They spent half an hour swimming to shore. They would've moved more quickly if only they'd stood up in the shallow water. The Midwestern monkeys descended on the new island arrivals immediately. The chief, Monkey-Do, offered his banana and a towel. The three were fast friends. The Chief told them they were a lovely couple. They eyed one another nervously and said out of unison, "We're not a couple." But Monkey-DO, had a knack for seeing, not unlike his second cousin Monkey-C who had a knack for doing. The family resemblance was uncanny. Anyway, after the awkward moment and the Monkey-C, Monkey-Do genealogy lesson, Monkey-Do cleared the error and the air by offering them drinks from coconuts. It seems that coconut cups are great healers of social ills in many cultures, none more so than the Midwestern ones. It's the hairy festiveness of the cups and the brightly colored straws. Never underestimate the comfort that monkeys and people take from brightly colored straws. With the drinks, the bond between Monkey-Do and my two friends became thick like my arm muscles. So there was still work to be done, it was the first day after all. They'd just met. Unrealistic expectations are a real downer. So, back off.

To move things along, I'll cut out the annoying monkey-people banter which rarely goes as smoothly as some people think, given the obvious genetic connection. To make a long and pointless story shorter, after many more coconuts of unidentified liquid my friends actually became a couple. Right there in front of the Monkey!

Some time passed. My friends were rescued. Monkey-Do tried to have a statue built in their honor, but working with contractors was never one of his strengths.

Statue or not, my friends later decided to marry. No monkeys or paddle-boats were included in the wedding, but it's still very embarrassing to go with them to the zoo, even now.

Welcome to 2006. It's going to be one of those years.