Because I’m here, and on the computer anyway, I’m doing a random ten, because it’s been four months. I guess I should call it the “quarterly random ten”. Not a bad mix; a couple of nostalgic old favorites, and one new favorite (which is a cover of an old favorite). See if you can guess what’s what…

1. “Train” – 4 Non Blonds
2. “Lady Aberlin’s Muumuu” – Jonathan Coulton
3. “Leaning on the Day’s Parade” – The Badlees
4. “You Give Love A Bad Name” – Bon Jovi
5. “Ring of Fire” – Social Distortion
6. “To The One I Love” – Joan Osborne
7. “Nobody’s Crying” – Patty Griffin
8. “Tomorrow’s Just Another Day” – Madness
9. “Lovesong” – Adele
10. “Falling Apart” – Darcie Miner

As I’m an early middle-age white male hipster contrarian type, I mostly ignored Whitney Houston past the initial wave of pop stardom (though “How Will I Know” and all that were pretty popular tunes when I was a ten year old). I saw “The Bodyguard” of course, and spent most of my time cringing at that scene where Whitney waved Costner’s gun around, and kept thinking about how much better Dolly’s version of “I Will Always Love You” was.

Honestly, though, until this weekend, I hadn’t thought much about Whitney Houston at all for about a decade. She just wasn’t on my radar at all.

That said, I found fellow traveller Amanda Marcotte’s piece in The American Prospect about Huston’s cultural influence thought provoking. The piece reminded me exactly how big Houston was, and how far she had to fall. She draws more than one comparison to Marilyn Monroe, which I honestly didn’t consider, but makes perfect sense once it’s pointed out.

Further, the piece hits on one of those larger truths about the difference between our private and public lives, which doesn’t get talked about enough, except when a famous person’s ugly personal business gets a good airing:

Being a huge celebrity exaggerates the compromise all human beings make to get along in society. Most of us have a messy inner life that we roll up and leave at home so we can present a pulled-together version of ourselves to the outside world. Despite overwrought claims that social networking and blogging have turned us into a TMI culture, we still control what we show and don’t show the world about ourselves. We don’t like being the target of nasty gossip or having our weaknesses exposed for the outside world to judge. Social networking has become another tool for us to protect and monitor our reputations.

And that’s the rub, really. All of us, even those of us with blogs and social networking accounts, are always projecting an image when we deal with the world around us. We do our best to keep our inner demons and turmoil hidden, and most of us end up managing, in some fashion to look like we’ve got it all together, even if, in our heart of hearts, we know we’re just barely keeping the demons at bay. Most of us are just anonymous faces in the throng of groundlings, so when our carefully crafted mask slips and our inner ugly is laid bare, the fallout is limited, relatively speaking. But when you’re a player on the stage, it becomes national news thanks to the voyeuristic tabloid culture we inhabit, and it’s much harder to get past that exposure of one’s humanity, and not everyone is able to bounce back.

It’s something worth thinking about and considering when dealing with our fellow humans, even those of us operating in relative obscurity amongst the rabble.

It’s been a while since I touched this particular feature. I don’t know why. Maybe I just needed a break. Or, it could be that I took my big box of discs out of the car a month or so ago, and haven’t gotten around to putting it back. There are, however, still discs in the car, because I’ve purchased a few over the last few weeks. Some of which I’ve mentioned here, some I have not. I shall discuss a few of these now:

♦ Jonah Knight – The Age of Steam: Strange Machines: This is one of two records I picked up at Marscon this year, and it’s one a really like. I first learned of Jonah and his particular brand of steampunk paranormal folk music last year at Balticon when I caught his set there, and enjoyed another performance last month at Marscon 2012. His solo acoustic sets are impressive – he plays it all on an ancient, well-worn Gibson acoustic (with amazing tone) using all sorts of alternative capo gymnastics and amazing right-hand fingerpicking technique, and it’s beautiful, intimidating, and slightly unsettling, given that the subject matter often revolves around mad science, steam-powered necromancy, and mysterious malevolent entities…and George Clooney. On the record, it maintains that same feeling, and adds some excellent intrumentation and accompaniment. Personally, I love the steam-whistles and anvils on “Time Machine” and the beautiful harmony vocals on “Once Around the Sun”. The record also contains what I consider to be the definitive version of CCR’s “Bad Moon Rising”, which captures the dread portents inherent in the lyrics better than any interpretation I’ve ever heard.

♦ Mikey Mason – Impotent Nerd Rage: Also purchased at Marscon 2012, and like the previous disc, signed by the artist and purchased from the artist’s own hand. Mason is a stand-up comic when he’s not doing the singer-songwriter thing, and the former definitely informs that latter. All the songs on this record are comedic in some way, and tend to dwell in the geek mileiu. The centerpiece is “She Don’t Like Firefly”, about a guy who has the perfect geek girlfriend, but has to dump her when he discover’s she’s not a fan of a certain Joss Whedon IP, which became a viral video “hit” last spring, leading to this project, crowdsourced via KickStarter. There’s a lot to love here – Songs paying tribute to Jek Porkins, Unicron, and the RPG Kobolds Ate My Baby!, as well as tracks dealing with geek life’s social challenges (see the title track and “My Next Girlfriend”); though my my favorite track is “Me and Alan Moore’s Beard”, a classically-told story/song about the narrator’s increasingly improbable adventures discovering himself and the world after meeting the titular comic icon’s facial hair (playing the role of the classic manic pixie dream girl) in a pub in Chinatown.

♦ Rodrigo y Gabriela and C.U.B.A. – Area 52: I only learned of the existence of RyG after hearing a profile of them on NPR one evening a couple of weeks ago – they’re a jazzy latin guitar duo from Mexico who have garnered lots of attention in Europe and in the United States, though they’ve never really made any waves in their native country. This, their most recent record, was recorded in Cuba with a host of Cuban musicians, paying tribute to the music of that country. The profile of Rodrigo and Gabriela indicate that they first met playing guitar in heavy metal bands. That pedigree comes through – the guitar playing on these tracks is largely nylon-stringed acoustic (except on the excellent Santana tribute “Hanuman” and a few other places), but carries the unmistakable feeling of a players who grew up headbanging. I’m to understand that this collaboration is not entirely typical of the band’s music, though it’s definitely got me intrigued enough to seek out more of their stuff, and to try and catch them live someday.

♦ Lana Del Ray – Born to Die: Apparently Ms. Del Ray manage to make a splash in the pop music world before this record was even released by marketing herself and offending a host of internet music critics with her very presence. Apparently I don’t frequent those music blogs, because I hadn’t heard of her until people started talking about her recent SNL performance, and it’s relative quality. I then heard a few sample tracks on the radio and online, and couldn’t resist the 9.99 price point at Target the other day. The record itself is not bad, certainly not the offense to taste that it’s been categorized as. It’s actually rather lush and atmospheric and highly listenable, as far as mainstream pop goes – the title track is a really nice pop song, as is the lead single “Video Games”. The sound as a whole seems to evoke elements from all sorts of other iconic performers – I hear bits of Tori Amos, Joan Osborne, Stevie Nicks, and others throughout the record, all of which are perfectly fine influences to build from. From where I’m standing, it’s a fine melancholy listening experience, even if the lyrics to “Diet Mtn Dew” don’t make much sense (I suspect much of it is placeholder lyrics which were never exchanged for something else).

♦ Van Halen – A Different Kind of Truth: Despite my general indifference to the lead single, “Tattoo” (as documented here), there was never really a question of whether I was going to track this one down or not – It’s the first new VH record in 14 years, with David Lee Roth out front – it was going to fall into my hands eventually. After giving it a spin or two, I’m pleasantly surprised; for a record that’s pretty obviously just an excuse to kick off a tour and play “Panama” and “Runnin’ With The Devil” again every night, there’s a lot of the “classic” Van Halen sound and feel at work here (not surprising, given that many of these tracks are re-worked versions of unrecorded songs from the band’s early club days). While there are no tunes here that feel destined to become classics, I can definitely see tracks like “You and Your Blues” and especially “Big River” (easily the strongest track here) fitting into a setlist with all the good stuff from Fair Warning and Women and Children First. The guitar playing is vintage Eddie Van Halen, which even on it’s worst day is pretty damned good; he brought the chops for these sessions. Dave’s voice, once it gets warmed up, still sounds good on record, even if there’s a little more scatting and a bit less howling these days. In short, it’s a good Van Halen record, and I’m glad the personalities set differences aside long enough to make it happen, though I can’t help but wonder how much better the whole package would sound if Michael Anthony was there holding the thing together on bass and harmony vocals.

Prolific comics blogger Chris Sims recently posted his thoughts on my current video game obsession, Skyrim, and finds it wanting. He admits that it’s fun to play, but unfocused; he finds the choices presented to the player, choices that should really define the way the sprawling story plays out, have very little impact.

For example, much of the game’s main quest involves ending the scourge of dragons who have mysteriously returned from legend after many centuries. Sims is right that this seems odd, given the way the game starts:

I mean, the very first thing that happens in the game is that a dragon showed up and kept me from getting my head cut off, so as far as I’m concerned, me and dragons are 100% cool with each other.

So yeah, there’s a little bit of mental disconnect required there.

On some level, I agree with his thesis; as great as the threats to the land of Skyrim are, these cataclysmic events that the player alone is destined to resolve have relatively little impact on the day-to-day life of the average citizen of the Nine holds, beyond the inconvenience of the occasional dragon attack. It’s hard, in a “wide open world” game, to generate a sense of urgency.

So far, I’ve been able to live with that. Part of that, I think, is the fact that I chose to pretty much sprint through the main questline involving the time travelling dragon god out to destroy the world, so the lack of fear in the populace regarding the coming apocalypse makes more sense. There are still occasional dragon attacks, but in this sort of fantasy world, I can believe that the outside chance of a giant winged reptile swooping down and setting his thatched roof on fire is something to which a farmer will eventually become desensitized.

At the point I’m at in the game, I’ve already saved the world from the supernatural threat of not-Ragnarok, and am taking some time to get to know the people of Skyrim and build up some more influence (apart from, you know, having just saved the world) before I move to address the more human threat: a looming civil war between the waning, distant Empire and a bunch of upstart “Skyrim First” rebels. This aspect of the quest makes more sense to leave alone for a while, because even as the game starts, the people of Skyrim mostly talk about the machinations of distant political conflicts as background, which requires much less suspension of disbelief. Sure, you run into die-hards on both sides, but most people are content to run their shops or chop their firewood, dismissing the affairs of government with a detached, sometimes amused cynicism. It’s a minor annoyance to people, but who’s in charge doesn’t make much difference to the average person who’s trying to scrape out a living in a world where trolls, necromancers, and demonic trickster demi-gods are a fact of life.

For me, this is where the fun of these sorts of games really kicks in – where the point is exploration, because around every turn is some interesting bit of scenery to marvel at or a new and novel situation to resolve or get involved in. Sure, a lot of them are fetch quests or “go slay the monster” tasks, but they’re fun because of the way the situations are crafted, each one a neat little short story to be told in the larger world, ranging from a bard missing her musical instrument to a talking dog who’s hit a bit of a snag in his relationship with his master.

So yeah, it’s kind of unfocused (and yeah, Fallout 3, which is mechanically almost the same game, is better at tying things together thematically), but my way of dealing with that was to knock the threat out early and then settle into the life of the freelance adventurer, doing odd jobs, crafting masterwork weapons and armor from ores I’ve mined myself, and generally finding my place in a well-crafed world no longer threatened by a looming apocalypse, but that still has hundreds of stories to tell.

I really can’t imagine having the time to pull something this OCD-nerdy together, but there’s somebody out there who has built a comprehensive timeline of the Marvel Movie Universe.

By spending hours and hours scouring DVDs with a finger on the pause button to grab dates from bakground newspaper pages and calendars, this guy has put every event from all the Marvel films in chronological order, in case somebody wanted to cut them all up and edit together a ten-hour prequel to the coming Avengers movie.

Honestly, it’s an impressive application of compulsion and geekdom.

…And speaking of The Avengers, the extended version of the Super Bowl spot that was teased last week before the game with a ten second version is really pretty cool, with a good look at the Hulk, and has prompted all sorts of speculation as to who those alien guys backing Loki are if they’re not the Skrulls. This is an interesting theory.

So, I watched the game yesterday. It was a good game. Better than usual. All games should be that good – talented teams in a well-balanced and somewhat strategic contest, and didn’t need any of that semi-staged “aw shucks” human interest story stuff about the more photogenic players tacked on to be compelling. It was also the first football game I watched all year. Wonder how that happened?

What we really ought to talk about, though, is the half-time show. Not much to say; it was a technically proficient dance routine to pre-recorded backing tracks, with the main attraction playing some of her greatest hits along with flashy lights and a couple of carefully planned surprise guest appearances.

My main thought on the whole business was really this: Remember when Madonna used to be shocking, controversial, and interesting?

About the time things came to a crecendo with “Like A Prayer” complete with choir, marching band, and guest pop star, my mind couldn’t help reaching back to the late 80s, when the song being performed (and the accompanying video) was so controversial that MTV banned it?

There was a time, not that long ago, when Madonna, given this kind of venue to perform, would have pulled off something ten times as provacative as Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction”, on purpose, then winked at the camera to make sure everyone caught it.

Last night’s performance was just tepid and bland (and the entrance ripped off Helen Hunt’s ripping-off-Liz-Taylor end-of-movie sting from Girls Just Want to Have Fun). And I think we’re all the worse off for it. I wonder if Madonna’s just mellowed with age, or was just muzzled (at least figuratively – there was a time when a literal muzzle would be exactly the kind of thing she’d go for). In any case, I’m rather upset with the state of mainstream American entertainment if it can manage to make Madonna, even 2012 Madonna, boring.

World Peace!

Today is my wife’s birthday. I’m happy she was born, so I could meet her, befriend her, fall in love with her, marry her, and keep hanging out with her.

As I write this (yesterday, actually – I’m spending today with her), I have no idea how we’ll be celebrating, but I’m sure it’ll be something nice that we’ll enjoy.

…and may involve yarn or some sort.

Happy Birthday.

Just something to think about – remember ten years ago when a computer not connected to broadband internet was a perfectly useful piece of equipment, and not a plastic and silicon doorstop?

I’d written a bit more here, but I deleted it after I realized it sounded an awful lot like Abe Simpson yelling at clouds and wearing onions on my belt.

Ever since I heard about it yesterday morning, I’ve been casting about for a proper way to talk about the Komen foundation’s decision to stop donating funds to Planned Parenthood (which does a lot of work to make early screenings for breast cancer available to all kinds of women), as a result of their “new administrative rule”, which is really about caving to the pressure of a vocal minority who has a problem with Planned Parenthood in general, and at least one service PP provides (though only makes up about three percent of PP’s total services).

This post is the best I can do. As usual, Scalzi does it better. But more about him later…

Despite the fact that I’m married to a woman, have fathered two of them, know and love many of them, and have had at least one relative who was directly affected by breast cancer, I’ve not thought a lot about the Komen organization. I’m pretty sure I’ve sponsored one or two officemates in one of those walks/races/whatevers they do over the years, and if you’re an American, it’s hard to avoid purchasing something or other with that pink ribbon device on it, but that’s really about it.

However, I, and pretty much everyone in America has some idea what that pink ribbon signifies; the goal of “raising awareness” for breast cancer is pretty much nailed (some might say it’s a case of over-awareness).

The thoughts I do have are generally about that ribbon, and the megolithic PR campaign behind it. Getting that ribbon on every box of cereal and container of yogurt in America can’t be cheap. I wonder if their money could be better spent funding research to “find the cure” or providing services to diagnose early (and early diagnosis is the best way to “cure” this disease right now) than on furthering the pink ribbon brand. According to statistics, Komen spends about 20% of it’s proceeds on “research”, which, while certainly not the worst record, it certainly isn’t the most efficient overhead-to-actual-support ratio for a charity to have.

And this move to cut off Planned Parenthood due to some sort of controversy means that even less money goes toward exactly the kind of services that can lower breast cancer rates and keep women healthier in general.

It’s Komen’s right to spend their money however they want, but it’s the right of everyone who finds the decision boneheaded to donate their money elsewhere, like to Planned Parenthood.

Incidentally, if you’re of the mind to see that Planned Parenthood gets a few extra bucks toward cancer screening and education services, and enjoy reading good books on your ereader or mobile device, you might want to click over to John Scalzi’s blog and make a note of the fact that for the next week, He’s donating his personal income from ebook sales to Planned Parenthood, specifically for breast cancer services. He’s got the details over there, and a great write-up describing his feelings on the whole situation.

Incidentally, both the books and the commentary are worth reading.

I greatly enjoyed this bit submitted commenter “Evan Hunt” regarding this post from slacktivist:

“I see some similarity between automobiles made by Ford and those made by Chrysler, but this is not indicative of a fundamental ‘Chrystlo-Ford automotive tradition’ at the root of American society.”

Like most things in Fred’s corner of the internet, it bears thinking on.