Yeah, quiet on all fronts the last week or so, save one or two harried tweets and a handful of desperate conversations. Sorry ’bout that.

The biggest hassle is a work thing. Part of my job is managing some exceptionally technical tasks that normally go beyond someone in my job series, given to me without much in the way of direction or assistance, which I’ve handled reasonably well thus far thanks to some semi-related past experience. However, some bad things happened last Thursday that were theoretically associated with some system changes I made. Since then, I’ve been entrenched nearly non-stop trying to solve the problem and occasionally working to not get thrown under a bus. Thankfully, the problem’s now been resolved, even if the logic it got sold on by the back-end guys is a little dodgy – at least my users are happy.

All I seem to have to show for it is several days worth of elevated blood pressure, a weekend that wasn’t a weekend, several near-breakdowns, and a good-natured nickname that’s taking the organization by storm across several states*. I suspect that forevermore, I’ll be known as “Clusterchuck”, which I guess is okay – go big or go home, right?

Add to that the usual tolls of my current commuting situation, the fact that we’re in the home stretch leading up to opening night of the school play (and all the attendant parent volunteer involvement), this whole sequestration thing hanging over the country which will, at this point, likely mean a few extra days off and a roughly 20% salary reduction over the next few months, and the fact that I was notified on Monday that I got identity-thefted to the tune of about $4000 out of my checking account last weekend (luckily, I got out in front of that quickly and have the money back (thanks, fraud department!), but it’s still a stressor I didn’t need.

So, I’m a little overwhelmed by events. I’m hoping I can find a few hours this weekend to get better. In the meantime, here are some tunes off my mp3 player. I suspect #2 would be honored to find itself in the company of #1, if I know them at all.

1. “Song for a Future Generation” – the B-52s
2. “Perhaps a Dream” – The Blibbering Humdingers
3. “Going Through The Motions (live)” – Aimee Mann
4. “You Really Got a Hold On Me” – She & Him
5. “These Wishes” – The Clarks
6. “Head Over Heels” – The Go-Gos
7. “No One Knows I’m Gone” – Scarlett Johannsen
8. “L.T. Johnny” – Big Back Forty
9. “Running Free (live)” – Iron Maiden
10. “I Found Space” – Miracles of Modern Science

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* – I’ve also become a verb, as in “oh, you really chucked that up“. Again, I stress that this is all good-natured among my co-workers; it’s a badge of honor.

Excellent grades in several AP History courses, a degree in History and Social Studies education (with significant credits sunk into American history), and the actual experience of teaching a high school honors history course as a substitute for a couple of weeks, and it wasn’t until today that I knew why the XYZ Affair of 1797-98 was actually called “the XYZ Affair”.

Or maybe I was just daydreaming in class that day. Who knows. Anyway, thank you, commute audiobook!

My friend Dan Nokes, chief artist and idea man at 21st Century Sandshark Studios, makes some pretty neat comic books. I’ve talked about them a bit here and there in this space (In fact, you can go and read Impossible Space Tales of the Last Pit Stop and The Reptile and Mr. Amazing: The Return of Kat Carson for free online right now!), because what’s a blog for if you can’t use it to talk about cool stuff like that?

Sadly, I missed checking in with Dan at this past weekend’s VA Comicon this weekend, because I’ve just got too much life going on at the moment. However, this morning, I managed to be looking at the right social networking site at the right time, and got my vote in for Dan’s nearly daily WARM UP QUICK SKETCH CHALLENGE, where fans and friends suggest ideas for his quickie warm-up sketches before he settles down to the real work of making small-press comics magic happen.

I suggested a chance meeting between a B-grade Marvel Comics vigilante and a real American hero, and Dan ran with it. I thought the results were rather cool:

That’s all, I just wanted to share.

Reporting here from the beginning of a four day weekend – took Friday off, which is mostly just taunting myself about the fact that I no longer have every Friday off. Doesn’t matter, I got to sleep in this morning. No huge plans for the weekend – gotta help load in some set pieces for the middle school play, get some laundry done, do some shopping, watch some movies and put in some hours in Skyrim, because the PS3 finally started getting the DLC.

That’s all from here. Enjoy some tunes:

1. “Where I End and You Begin” – Radiohead
2. “All She Wants Is” – Duran Duran
3. “Westside Angst” – that dog.
4. “Think of England” – The Clarks
5. “Sunday Morning Comin’ Down” – Johnny Cash
6. “Sasquatch” – Tenacious D
7. “Black Steel in the Hour of Cha – Public Enemy
8. “Tell Me True” – Sarah Jarosz
9. “Suzy Lee” – The White Stripes
10. “Sing” – She & Him

A while back, I posted this cartoon from Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal largely without comment:

I posted it because it encapsulated a certain truth regarding the nature of pop music and nostalgia. A truth that I found was more or less borne out in the contents of this list at Buzzfeed making the case that 1987 was an “Amazing Year for Music”, citing 43 examples of songs and records that were released that year.

I turned thirteen in 1987, and like a lot of kids that age, I was, to the extent that geography and access allowed me, very much into the pop music of the day. Of the examples cited on that list (I suggest you go look, especially if you’re of an age with me), I could immediately recall a mental recording of at least 35 of them immediately, because frankly, that’s the way I’m wired. There’s some great stuff here, from what some (read: me) consider the golden age of MTV, five or six years into it’s broadcast life – enough time to get past “proof of concept” and work out the serious kinks, but before the age of reality programming, so the M still stood for “Music”.

I think it’s a pretty universally great list. 1987, among other things, brought us records I appreciated at the time like only a naive teenager could. Bon Jovi’s Slippery When Wet. Guns n Roses’ Appetite For Destruction. Def Leppard’s Hysteria. Pop Masterpieces like George Micheal’s Faith. U2’s The Joshua Tree, and Michael Jackson’s Bad. More complex stuff I didn’t fully appreciate or even know about until much later, like The Replacements’ Pleased To Meet Me and R.E.M.’s Document. As well as, you know, less artistically significant, fleeting confections that nonetheless had a significant affect on my thirteen year old self.

Ahem.

So yes, musically, it was pretty good year, all things considered. And the Buzzfeed list (and playlist!) covers almost all the highlights. Almost. Were I compiling it, I certainly wouldn’t have left this one out. It pretty much covers all the bases in the previous paragraph, and is perhaps one of the world’s perfect pop records:

Thankfully, having a space like this allows me to correct that grievous error.

Because I always do, The State of the Union Drinking Game.

Sadly, I can’t really stay up late enough to watch, as I have to work my usual early (if from home) tomorrow. I’ll have to make due with excerpts (worth 7 or 8 drinks by my count) now, and the full transcript later.

All over the map this week. Swinging from dark into light with some frequency, often within hours. Luckily, by the end of the week, I spent a lot more time at the positive end of the spectrum, thanks to a couple of little victories. Still, I’m ready for my work week to be over, so I can have a little time to rest and accomplish something for me instead of for someone else.

Also on the bright side, This week I managed to teach myself a pretty neat little arrangement of “Here Comes the Sun” on the ukulele. No Beatles below, though plenty of other good tunes. You should explore some of them.

1. “The Rain” – The Swell Season
2. “ScoobyThulu” – Mikey Mason
3. “Dobby, Bang Your Head” – The Blibbering Humdingers
4. “Same Thing” – Barenaked Ladies
5. “Better Off Without You (live)” – The Clarks
6. “Runnin’ With the Devil” – Van Halen
7. “The Best Damned Thing” – Avril Levigne
8. “Cloisonné (live studio version)” – TMBG
9. “Ride Home” – The Shadowboxers
10. “Where Eagles Dare” – Iron Maiden

Confidential to one particular comment spammer from last night: Good show, old chap! Your random text almost made sense in context – I had to look twice before deleting you!

Looks like the Boy Scouts have put off making a decision regarding gay admittance to the organization, at least until May.

(incidentally, nice placement of the God and Country medal, the default Protestant religious emblem, in the photo on the linked HuffPo article. Points off for the age of the photo, though – “Quality Unit 1997?” wow.)

Anyway, I’m not necessarily surprised. Despite the Boy Scout motto being “Be Prepared”, I expect that the BSA was not at all prepared for the outpouring of commentary from the public on this one (although they really should have been). It seems to me that humans who hold with these sorts of exclusionary opinions tend to overestimate the acceptance of those opinions across the broader public, or even within their own organization.

This country is trending toward acceptance and equality in terms of sexual orientation. Note the recent Quinnipiac Poll on the BSA issue, showing a 22% advantage among voters (admittedly not necessarily a perfect metric) favoring elimination of the ban (even higher among women, who in my experience, tend to dominate Parents’ committees, and make up the majority of leader ranks at the Cub level).

In a lot of ways, the writing’s on the wall, and I think that this delay is the Boy Scouts of America giving themselves time to come to terms with the fact that the world, in this area at least, has passed them by. Change will come eventually, and it’ll come both as a result of an outpouring of public individual support, from little peons like me and my friends on social networks boosting this particular signal, all the way up to the President of the United States, and through the loss of corporate donations as the megacorps don’t wish to be associated with a group that discriminates againsts a significant segment of their customer base.

You can’t run giant international Jamborees every couple of years without big corporate backing – in the end, it’s going to be the economic angle that brings about change. However, let’s not discount the power of personal seniment – as such, please consider letting the BSA know how you feel on the issue.

Oh, it’s that time of year…and Chris at Comics Alliance has the rundown of the “best” store-bought valentine cards out there this year, including this one, where Michaelangelo threatens to beat the object of his affection with nunchaku.

…plus, you know, it has my name on it, so that’s cool.

Spent a little time this weekend touring the Virginia Holocaust Museum in Shockoe Bottom in Richmond, along the canal. It’s an entirely different experience than the better known museum in DC, though it still has the same sort of solemn atmosphere.

Not going to write much. But will share a couple of images, reflecting both the horror of those years, and humanity’s reaction to it. Draw your own conclusions.

♦ A collage of sketches stuffed off in a quiet corner I expect most people miss. Was probably the most affecting piece in the museum for me:

♦ And this small little scrap of blessing stuck on a column toward the end of the self-guided experience. Made me smile: