Hasselhoff and Milk

David Hasselhoff is the greatest vocal artist of all time. If you don't believe me, then check out these reviews of Best of David Hasselhoff. Here is a sampling of one of the reviews:

Twice the ruggedness of mortal man, ten times the talent of any other artist, Hasselhoff dazzles on this CD. Every track has been plucked from the heavens and trembles with vigor and force. God Himself could not record as good a greatest hits album like this, and if He were to listen to all 17 tracks on this compilation, He would refrain from striking me down for blasphemy.

Got ambrosia? If not, check out Tuscan Milk. Here is an excerpt:

cold, delicious, white
Tuscan Whole Milk satisfies
does a body good

The perfect evening: listening to The Hoff while drinking Tuscan Milk. Some day.

The Day

• Workout: hurt back has me taking it easy
  
• Music: Grateful Dead, Funkadelic, G. Love & Special Sauce, Joe Jackson, Marvin Gaye
  

Will Farrell Is a Funny Man

I have been so busy with work that I have not had the gumption to write about anything even a little bit serious. The Tiger Woods/lynching hubbub, politics stuff, and other issues have come and gone, but I can't get myself to write about them. At some point I will return to more serious topics, but for now, it's all about the fluff.

Will Farrell is really great and some of his best stuff is available online.

• Neil Diamond
• Cow Bell
• Landlord

That's it. No pontificating. No deep insights. Just a few fun videos.

Enjoy.

The Day

• Workout: crunches
  
• Music: The Bad Plus
  

My Life in Music: Undergrad, Take 2

Like many people I know, my college days are partly defined by the music I listened to. The lists of musical groups and songs are too long, but the list of key albums is relatively small.

Undergrad, Take 2

• New Order, Low-Life
• Violent Femmes, Hallowed Ground
• Beastie Boys, License to Ill
• The Talking Heads, Stop Making Sense
• Pat Metheny, Travels
  

Each of these albums has its own set of memories that comes along with the music.

Low-Life and Hallowed Ground both conjure up memories of hanging out in Chris and short, hairy Steve's dorm room. To me, these albums sound like a college dorm and like WHFS in its hey-day. They are dark and fun albums, which makes them the perfect soundtracks for angst-ridden college students. Specifically, these albums were played at Poseurs, a niteclub in Georgetown where one could see spiky, fluorescent pink mohawks and lots of crazy stuff. It was the place to be for folks who were into alternative music.

License to Ill is the sound of Friday afternoons. I knew that Steve was out of class on Friday as I walked across campus and could hear License to Ill blasting from the speaker Steve had pointing out his dorm window. This is some seriously happy music because it is "Friday afternoon and classes are done" music.

A bunch of my friends and I saw Stop Making Sense a few times. Chris had it on video and knew the tape so well that he could fast-forward to a seemingly random spot, hit play, and sing along without missing a step. We were seriously into that movie and album. Now, My Boy loves the album. He often asks for Talking Heads and to him, that means Stop Making Sense.

Travels is the music I listened to while getting ready to head to class. I also saw Metheny in concert at Wolf Trap and he was amazing. Metheny and his keyboardist Lyle Mays are absolutely virtuosos and the concert was full of energy. At least half the songs were given standing ovations.

As I said, there are many other songs and artists that made up my undergrad days, but these are some of the albums with the most vivid and lasting memories.

DVDs That Come to Me

We have finally signed up for Netflix and I already like it.

In case you don't know what Netflix is about, you go to a website and set up a queue of movies. They send you the top movies from your queue that are available along with a postage-paid envelope for returning them. You send each movie back whenever you want, then they send you the next available one from the top of your queue.

No late fees. No 11:48 runs to the video store drop box. There will always be a movie in the house that we want to watch. We'll watch way more movies this way and won't have a problem with picking the occasional flick that one of us loves but the other hates (we have the two videos at a time plan.)

The queue could become a challenge, but the idea is to not have two flicks in a row that the same person doesn't want to watch. For instance, Transformers and 300 should not be back to back. Steel Magnolias and The Piano should not be back to back. Alternating is ok. Our tastes are pretty compatible, but every once in a while, She will want to watch some chick flick (e.g., Steel Magnolias) and every once in a while, I will want to watch a guy flick (e.g., Full Metal Jacket or Transformers) or a more artsy (e.g., No Country for Old Men) or quirky (e.g., Napoleon Dynamite) flick.

Anyway, I am looking forward to watching more movies. Netflix should be fun.

The Day

• Workout: crunch
  
• Music: Crystal Method, Steely Dan, Sublime
  

A Web Nugget

Freaks Everywhere

A friend of mine was in town from Germany, so we had an extra "Craps" Night last night. I'm a really boring guy. I work a normal job making normal money. I spend just about all of my time either with my family (usually at home) or working. I drive an 11-year old Nissan and live in a tiny rambler in a nondescript American suburb. I don't really know any celebrities to speak of, though I am just a few degrees of separation from a few (none of whom I have met.) At "Craps" Night, I get a glimpse of some different worlds. My friend who lives in Germany is about to start working at a company where he will be on the company's board and run their sales organization. He hasn't worked for over half a year since he was given a massive (over a year's worth) severance from his old company. This severance was the culmination of amazing drama that involved heart attacks, mass firings, and a bunch of lawyers. Another friend of mine is what I like to call a hustler. He really knows how to make money. He's a very successful entrepreneur (mostly real estate stuff right now) and seems to drive a beautiful new car every few weeks. The amazing thing about him is that he has amazing connections, but he has opened my eyes about being connected. Many people imagine that you get connections because you were born to the right family or went to the right school or some other element of chance. This guy makes connections because he is someone who makes connections. Nothing has been handed to him. His parents aren't particularly connected. He didn't go to any Ivy League schools. He hustles and I really admire him for it. I sometimes wish I had his skills with making money and connections, but that's not who I am. I am a homebody who works a lower-risk, lower-income job, but I appreciate the high drama and fun stories he brings to any get-together. What did I learn last night?

1. Just about every famous person is a freak. I learned about a bunch of pro athletes and movie stars who sleep with dozens of women every week. Even the guys who are married are sleeping with everything with two legs.
2. Lots of celebrities and athletes are gay, but don't admit it. Even many of the celebs who are married are gay.
3. Even attractive, intelligent, ivy league-educated doctors and lawyers can be total freaks.
4. A very famous boxer got paid tens of millions under the table by an equally famous boxing promoter. The boxer is scary, but still claims to have ten new women lined up to sleep with him every day. He has also been investigated for rape at least 20 times in the last 3 years.

The stories that these connected guys were telling were amazingly prurient. Lots of celebrities. Lots of smut. Lots of shocking allegations (e.g., "he pretends to have girlfriends, but he's gay" or "he screws every woman who comes to his house for a party"). I don't take all of these allegations as gospel, but it's fun to believe them until they are disproven. My glimpse into this other world is really fun. It doesn't change how I live, but it's like a really amazing interactive version of the greatest gossip magazine ever. Compared to these guys, my life is so ordinary, but now I get to watch TV and say "what a freak/sleaze/jerk/hypocrite" whenever I see someone who stars in one of my friends' stories. The Day

• Workout: none (cleaners came early this morning. it's a weak excuse, but all i have)
• Music: The Police, The Pretenders

Mr. Tony Is Back

Mr. Tony is back on the air.

I have never been a big drive-time morning zoo kind of a guy, but a friend of mine from work got me into listening to Tony Kornheiser's show last Spring. I actually listened to it as a podcast through iTunes, so I didn't have to listen to commercials and was able to listen to the entire show. This all came to an end in July when The Tony put the show on hold while he went off to do Monday Night Football.

Tony is smart and fairly funny. He also gets interesting guests and has a crew around him who are a pretty engaging ensemble. Topics range from sports to politics to pop culture to whatever news catches Tony's eye. It's not a morning zoo show. It's not NPR (which is what I usually listen to in the morning.) It's a conversation that is at turns insightful, fun, and interesting.

After a long hiatus, Mr. Tony's show is back on the air. You can listen to it at 3wtradio.com where you can either listen to the stream or subscribe to the podcast. Now I have "Seems Like Old Times" as sung by Diane Keaton in Annie Hall going through my mind. Having Tony back is a good thing. Radio is his element. He's decent on PTI, but is not good on MNF. Radio is his bag and his show really works for me.

The Day

• Workout: crunches and push-ups
  
• Music: The Beatles, Rachmaninoff
  

Big as Life: Some Thoughts on Obesity, Part 2

A couple days ago, I saw the show: Big as Life: Obesity in America. Here are some more thoughts.

As I was (unsuccessfully) looking for this video or at least a trailer for it online, I found this woman's blog entry about watching the show. Her entry was touching. Her comments about people who are walking the fine line between self-acceptance and delusion (e.g., people who were saying that "there are no health problems with being fat") as well as the endocrinologist who doesn't jump to judge obese people really struck me. The really interesting part of her post was her reaction to seeing fat people as the focus of attention. She's not comfortable with her weight and it causes her real distress.

Some people are really happy in their big bodies, but I would guess that a much greater percentage have had a hard time living as large people. Our society's focus on waif-like Abercrombie & Fitch or Cosmo models is no more healthy than our increasing waist size and decreasing activity level. The extremes seem unhealthy to me. Healthiness lies somewhere between couch potato and marathoner, between big macs every day and fad diets, between fat is great and fat is evil. The extremes are either unhealthy, hard to maintain for the long run, or both.

I wish every person who struggles with weight the strength and persistence to find their middle ground to happiness.

I remember when a study came out that said that people who are "overweight" had lower incidence of certain bad health stuff than folks who are "normal." Jacob Sullum at Reason Online has some interesting thoughts on this. Basically, you could argue that being "overweight" is the healthiest range to be in (thus, I have named my gut "life extender"), but you can't say the same for the "obese" or "underweight" ranges. The middle is pretty broad. The extremes are still unhealthy.

The Day

• Workout: crunches and push-ups
  
• Music: Adrian Belew, Beastie Boys
• Diana Krall - 's Wonderful