And I would ride 500 miles in a car and I would ride 500 more...

Seriously. It's almost exactly 500 miles from my house to my aunt's in Michigan.

Had a nice time at the wedding. Saw lots of relatives, stuffed myself with food, even caught the bouquet. But for some reason, my favorite part of the trip to Michigan was while I was at the Detroit Science Center with my uncle and cousin Saturday morning.

Written on the back of a sign leading to a display was this.

"While you are reading this, I am eating your samich"

I am so easily amused.

Summer's Here!

And the time is right, for....driving hundreds of miles to my cousin's wedding this weekend. Not exactly dancing in the streets here over the long car ride. Time to load lots of video into the iPod.

So that squeaky noise in my car? The one I asked to have checked out when I took it in to get my horn replaced? It was some of the joints about to collapse. Yes, the front end of my car was about to fall off, and no one at the inspection station noticed.

Twelve hundred dollars later, my car is all better, and my checkbook cried a little. But this is still cheaper than paying for a new car.

Before I go back to sleep...

It's 5:43 in the morning. I've just gotten out of the shower. Final exams start today.

Or maybe not.

I just got two calls telling me that the town I work in has no power due to last night's thunderstorms, and school is canceled.

This completely throws off my schedule, as I needed to take tomorrow off for an appointment, and they might schedule the two finals I had to give today for tomorrow.

On the other hand, I just realized I managed to schedule two things for this afternoon at around the same time, and now that I'm free the whole day, I can hopefully move one of those things up.

That one thing would be my annual eye exam (woo myopia!), which I set two months ago because I wanted an after school appointment. The other thing? Taking my car into the shop, which I set yesterday and didn't realize that they were at the same time.

Why is my car going into the shop? Because it failed inspection. It did not fail for having the emissions of a thirteen year old car. It did not fail because of the squeaking sounds that emit from under the car when I turn the wheel. (Although I'm going to ask to have that checked out.) No, it failed because the horn doesn't work. And because the oil change sticker on my windshield was a "visual obstruction." That's just being dicky, in my distinguished opinion. But the car's going in for a new horn now, so I don't have to physically yell "beep!" whenever someone cuts me off on the highway.

Hopefully I can manage to get back to sleep now, since my town has power (although parts of it had no water yesterday, apparently), and I have an air conditioner.

Heading for the home stretch

Teachers get excited for the end of the school year too, you know. We also have a lot of hard work coming to an end that we're happy for. On a similar note, we are also happy for school cancellations, as evidenced by my jumping up and down at a phone call I received this evening, telling me that schools in my district will be closed tomorrow, due to the expected 100-degree heat. This brings the number of school days left on my calendar to eight. And I've had that countdown going for over a month now.

I have another vignette to share to end this post.

A month or so ago a fundraising company sent us two of their cookies in the hopes that we'd do our fundraising with them. We already do, but whatever, free cookies! Even though my colleague and I were wary of cookies sent through the mail with fairly flimsy packaging, we each took one, bit into them....and spat them out. They tasted like old dusty dirt.

Last Friday, I found another package from that company in my mailbox. I went back to the choir room and tossed the package of cookies to some students that were hanging out in there, warning them that it might not taste so good. Then I noticed a pink piece of paper still in the envelope.

"OOPS!" was written in big block letters on top. The note went on to say that a newly-printed brochure likely affected the taste of the cookies in the last package, and enjoy a new batch. My laughter at this attracted the attention of the students happily eating the new cookies, and I had to explain to them that their dumb teachers had eaten the old cookies. Oops indeed.

Okay, let's try this again.

Literally the day after I made my last post, my brother coincidentally mentioned to me that there's also a 1001 albums to hear before you die list. Now we're talking my language: music. But I'm going to do this one a little differently. If I have at least one song from the album in my iTunes library, I'll include it here. If I have the whole album, I'll star it.

And keep in mind, reading this list has caused me to want to make some additions to my iTunes collection, but I'll do that later. And there are several albums on here that I do own in their entirety, but don't want to put in their entirety in my iTunes, so they're not starred.

Elvis Presley – Elvis Presley
Fats Domino – This is Fats
The Crickets – The Chirping Crickets
Little Richard – Here’s Little Richard
Dave Brubeck – Time Out
Joan Baez – Joan Baez
The Everly Brothers – A Date with the Everly Brothers
Ray Charles - Modern Sounds in Country & Western Music
The Beatles – With the Beatles*
Bob Dylan – The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan
Sam Cooke – Live at the Harlem Square*
Stan Getz & João Gilberto – Getz/Gilberto
The Beatles – A Hard Day’s Night*
Bob Dylan – Bringing it All Back Home*
The Beatles – Rubber Soul*
Bob Dylan – Highway 61 Revisited
The Who – My Generation
The Beatles – Revolver*
The Beach Boys – Pet Sounds
Bob Dylan – Blonde on Blonde
The Mamas & the Papas – If You Can Believe Your Eyes & Ears*
The Rolling Stones – Aftermath
Simon & Garfunkel – Parsley, Sage, Rosemary & Thyme*
The Beatles – Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band*
Cream – Disraeli Gears
The Who – Sell Out
Donovan – Sunshine Superman
Jimi Hendrix – Are You Experienced
Jimi Hendrix – Axis: Bold as Love
Aretha Franklin – I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You
The Rolling Stones – Beggars Banquet
Jimi Hendrix – Electric Ladyland
Simon & Garfunkel – Bookends*
The Band – Music from Big Pink
The Zombies – Odessey & Oracle
The Beatles – The Beatles [aka the White Album]*
Crosby, Stills & Nash – Crosby, Stills & Nash
The Beatles – Abbey Road*
The Rolling Stones – Let it Bleed
Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin II
Sly & the Family Stone – Stand!
Derek & the Dominos – Layla & Other Assorted Love Songs
John Lennon – Plastic Ono Band*
Led Zeppelin – III
Van Morrison – Moondance
George Harrison – All Things Must Pass*
Simon & Garfunkel – Bridge Over Troubled Water*
Paul McCartney – McCartney
Marvin Gaye – What’s Going On
John Lennon – Imagine*
Don McLean – American Pie
Led Zeppelin – IV
Rod Stewart – Every Picture Tells a Story
Nilsson, Harry – Nilsson Schmilsson
Neil Young – Harvest
Stevie Wonder – Talking Book
Paul Simon – Paul Simon
The Temptations – All Directions
Elton John – Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
Stevie Wonder – Innervisions
Paul McCartney & Wings – Band on the Run
Queen – Sheer Heart Attack
Bob Marley & the Wailers – Natty Dread
Led Zeppelin – Physical Graffiti
Bruce Springsteen – Born to Run
Dion – Born to Be With You
Queen – A Night at the Opera
Billy Joel – The Stranger
Electric Light Orchestra – Out of the Blue
Peter Gabriel – Peter Gabriel
Elvis Costello – My Aim is True
Sex Pistols – Never Mind the Bollocks, Here’s the Sex Pistols
Elvis Costello – This Year’s Model
B52s – B52s
The Clash – London Calling
Michael Jackson – Off the Wall
AC/DC – Back in Black
Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five – The Message
Bruce Springsteen – Born in the USA
Paul Simon – Graceland
Michael Jackson – Bad
NWA – Straight Outta Compton
Black Crowes – Shake Your Money Maker
Nirvana – Nevermind
Smashing Pumpkins – Siamese Dream
Liz Phair – Exile in Guyville
Nirvana – In Utero
Sheryl Crow – Tuesday Night Music Club
Portishead – Dummy
Beastie Boys – Ill Communication
TLC – CrazySexyCool
Offspring – Smash
Blur – Parklife
Notorious BIG – Ready to Die
Jeff Buckley – Grace
Nirvana – MTV Unplugged in New York
Nine Inch Nails – Downward Spiral
Green Day – Dookie
Foo Fighters – Foo Fighters
Garbage – Garbage
Smashing Pumpkins – Mellon Collie & the Infinite Sadness
Elastica – Elastica
Oasis – (What’s the Story) Morning Glory?
Beck – Odelay
The Eels – Beautiful Freak
Fiona Apple – Tidal
Fugees – The Score
Ash – 1977
Blur – Blur
Radiohead – OK Computer
System of a Down - System of a Down
Red Hot Chili Peppers – Californication
Coldplay – Parachutes
Eminem – Marshall Mathers LP
Gorillaz – Gorillaz
The Strokes – Is This It
The White Stripes – White Blood Cells
Norah Jones – Come Away with Me
Coldplay – A Rush of Blood to the Head
Johnny Cash – American IV: Man Comes Around
The Flaming Lips – Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
Beck – Sea Change
Justin Timberlake – Justified
The Vines – Highly Evolved
Radiohead – Hail to the Thief
The White Stripes – Elephant
OutKast – Speakerboxxx/Love Below
Rufus Wainwright – Want One
Brian Wilson – SMiLE
Franz Ferdinand – Franz Ferdinand*
Kanye West – College Dropout
Rufus Wainwright – Want Two
The Killers – Hot Fuss
The White Stripes – Get Behind Me Satan

Only 134?! Well, that's better than the other two, at least. And I've heard of a lot of the stuff on the list, but it's just not on my iTunes. Sigh. Where's the "1001 pieces of renaissance choral music to hear before you die" list? I'd rock that one.

Listy goodness to prove my lack of pop culture immersion

Through Kottke I found a list of 1001 movies to see before you die. I decided to make a list of my own of these movies, of what I'd seen. I also added some from the alterations of the list here. And like Kottke, I starred my favorites. It's only 1000 movies, right? Surely I must have seen at least 100 of them, right?

Wrong.


A Trip to the Moon (1902)
Seven Chances (1925)
The Gold Rush (1925)
Triumph of the Will (1934)
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Gone With the Wind (1939)
West Side Story (1961)
The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964)
A Hard Day’s Night (1964)*
The Sound of Music (1965)
The Jungle Book (1967)
Woodstock (1970)
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971)
The Godfather (1972)
Sleeper (1973)
The Godfather Part II (1974)
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)
Star Wars (1977)*
Grease (1978)
The Muppet Movie (1979)
Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back (1980)*
Airplane! (1980)
E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
A Christmas Story (1983)
Star Wars: Episode VI - Return of the Jedi (1983)*
Amadeus (1984)
This Is Spinal Tap (1984)
Ghostbusters (1984)
Back to the Future (1985)
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
The Naked Gun (1988)
Big (1988)
Rain Man (1988)
When Harry Met Sally (1989)
Do the Right Thing (1989)
Glory (1989)
Goodfellas (1990)
Edward Scissorhands (1990)
Raise the Red Lantern (1991)
The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
Philadelphia (1993)
Forrest Gump (1994)*
Clerks (1994)*
The Lion King (1994)*
Pulp Fiction (1994)
Babe (1995)
Toy Story (1995)
Clueless (1995)
Independence Day (1996)
Scream (1996)
Titanic (1997)
The Big Lebowski (1998)
The Blair Witch Project (1999)
Being John Malkovich (1999)
American Beauty (1999)
The Sixth Sense (1999)
The Matrix (1999)
Gladiator (2000)
Meet the Parents (2000)
Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)
O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000)*
Amelie (2001)*
Moulin Rouge (2001)*
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
Adaptation (2002)
Chicago (2002)
Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)
Lost in Translation (2003)
Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004)
Sideways (2004)
Brokeback Mountain (2005)

That's 73. And the problem with that is I don't even remember if I've seen some of these in their entirety. See, most of these were not seen by me by a distinct desire to go see that specific movie. I half-watched them when they appeared on cable or I watched them for a class (like I would watch Triumph of the Will voluntarily. come on). I'm just not a movie person, I guess. I don't have the attention span to sit through them. Speaking of, there's at least three movies on that list where I definitely have not seen the ending, due to my falling asleep beforehand.

Surely the number I've read on the 1001 books to read before you die will be better, right?


Beloved – Toni Morrison
Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
Breakfast of Champions – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.*
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings – Maya Angelou
Slaughterhouse-five – Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.*
Cat’s Cradle – Kurt Vonnegut
The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov*
Lord of the Flies – William Golding
Invisible Man – Ralph Ellison
The Catcher in the Rye – J.D. Salinger
Nineteen Eighty-Four – George Orwell
Animal Farm – George Orwell
The Little Prince – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
The Awakening – Kate Chopin
The Yellow Wallpaper – Charlotte Perkins Gilman
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Scarlet Letter – Nathaniel Hawthorne
Frankenstein – Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
Candide – Voltaire
Gulliver’s Travels – Jonathan Swift

Crap. Only 25, and all of them books I've read for a class for read with the intention on writing a paper on them for a class. At least I've reread many of them willingly. I shall blame this on that I either read more non-fiction, or more crappier books. (There's probably about five books on that list that I was supposed to read for a class and then didn't. Heh.)

I guess I shall be spending my summer watching movies and reading books. But it will probably end up being movies I've already seen and books I've already read. Oh well. I guess the point I'm trying to make here is that I have seen and read bits and pieces of many more on the lists, and probably know the general story of even more. This is the trick to making yourself seem smart: Know a little about a lot, and everyone will think you know what you're talking about, even when you haven't read the book, or seen the movie, or seen the movie based on the book.

A Lack of Truth in Advertising

Yesterday, Jarret and I were wandering around one of those stores that have clothes in the front and an odd assortment of housewares in the back. We were in the housewares section when I spotted an item called a "cube shelf" - I suppose it was for displaying your special stuff a little higher than your crappy stuff.

"Hey Jarret, do you want your very own cube?" I handed one to him. He peered at it.

"It doesn't look very cubey."

"Well, maybe the packaging makes it look funny."

Jarret then turned the box over and found this.

The "cube shelf" was, by definition, not a cube.

I feel so cheated.