i dated this dude* once.

[serious, serious,] SRSLY, by tpick

"would you like to go for a bicycle ride?"
"uh, no, i'm going to be riding by myself, because i have to do particular stuff."

*not this dude in particular, but a dude who did go to bed at eight and who, when i brought him chocolate chip cookies i'd baked that afternoon, declined them because it was during road season. it didn't last long.

my current earworm

i've continued to be freaked out by michelle bachmann's iowa straw poll win (i also keep imagining handfuls of actual straw being involved in this event.) bachmann freaks me out. even before i saw Bachmann-eyezed! but then i read what ed from gin and tacos wrote about it, and i started to feel a little bit better:

"The Ames (aka Iowa) Straw Poll is the dumbest event in politics by a country mile, even compared to legendary shitshows like CNN/YouTube debates, the Thanksgiving sparing of a turkey, and the national conventions.
...
The media have managed to turn this non-event – previously won by the likes of Pat Robertson – into a crucial barometer of candidate viability."


the whole thing is worth a read.

and when you're done with that (or before, if you prefer), please enjoy this video:


hot chip, "i feel better"

"White dudes, Punjabi music, and Marijuana...here is the result!"*

"how to dance when you're high on life"
(daler mehndi's tunak tunak tun)

*this was my friend's dad's explanation of this video. apparently funny runs in the family; see hers at a likely story.

highly recommended

bob dylan's "friday"



and the dunciad's elegant explication.

adorable doggy + cute boy + general silliness

"Pinga" dancing hip-hop

dan deacon show=summer camp for grownups

last night i went to a dan deacon show. i was tired. i am tired. lately, i have been tired. last night was no exception. there were some openers, so by the time it was dan's turn i was pretty tired and also tired of being stepped on and pushed by people way taller than me.

but then his set started, and it was really...fun. i've been to a lot of shows in my life, i think, and i like live music, but rarely have i had so much fun at a concert. a nice time, a good time, even a great time, but a fun time?

every now and then he'd give us directions (creating, for example, a dance contest where my side of the room had to "dance like jurassic park" and the opposite side was to "dance like what you wish the movie avatar was actually about.") and just about everyone enthusiastically went along with it (even when the activities involved kneeling on the beer-soaked floor.)

it was during the song where everyone was supposed to dance under the bridge made by the arms of a few volunteers, then emerge from the other side to add their own arms to the bridge that i really noticed it. i was outside, watching strangers dance beneath me when i had the strong urge to compliment them. and just as i was feeling pretty amused by that, someone said, "great job! thank you for being so strong for me!"

and all the dancing and activities and silliness really made me think of summer camp, and the many times that i've seen junior highers or high school kids who were too cool for everything forget about that and just have uncomplicated, unself-conscious fun.

it was great.

"heartbeats" by the knife, or covered by josé gonzález: both excellent. happy new year!

"heartbeats" the knife


"heartbeats" josé gonzález

i apologize for the inevitable ad for bp's youtube channel where you can watch lots of pr bs about how they're "making it right." do they really think we're that stupid?

free advice for bp: you "make it right" by actually making it right, not by spending millions of dollars on a media blitz in which you talk about making it right. thanks for ruining everyone's ocean.

bonus video because it is really fun and to avoid ending on a cranky note:


"heartbeats" josé gonzález and a lot of bouncy balls in san francisco.

earworm alert! or: that's really the only way to wish someone the best.

cee lo green, "forget you"


cee lo green, "f*** you"

this song is stuck in my head most of the time these days (both versions, in case you were curious.) i thought i'd share the catchiness with you too. also, as a special bonus:


gwyneth paltrow on glee, "forget you"

the antidote to those awesome/horrifying big dog/little dog videos

(50X) Autonomously folding a pile of 5 previously-unseen towels


while i know that robotics technology generally boils down to military-related applications, it's kind of cute to see this robot folding laundry.

also, the highest rated comment insults naysayers by quoting murray head's "one night in bangkok," which wikipedia calls "a sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek denunciation of the city's moral corruption and comparative glorification of the intellectual purity of chess: e.g., 'the queens we use would not excite you.'" "one night in bangkok" is also notable for being the last show tune to make into the top five most popular american songs. and it is from a musical about a chess match between an american and a soviet chess player. the 80's were really a different time. seriously.


one night in bangkok

since it's still before thanksgiving, christmas songs are not appropriate. except for this one. this one is awesome.

bhangra jingle bells

incredibly sad.

karla lemon was a fantastic human being. san francisco chronicle obituary.

dear brain,

what? why? how on earth did you come up with this song to play in my head? i think it's been twelve years since i saw this particular episode of south park and i'm pretty sure i haven't seen it or thought of it since.

this is why we forget people's names two seconds after we hear them.



eric cartman's german dance. seriously, wtf?

song of the moment

cocorosie, "werewolf"

cocorosie is super weird, it's true. this is the song i can't get enough of at the moment. if you find yourself in a similar position, you can download both "werewolf" and "rainbowarriors" here.

in which my relationship with the jesus is distilled into two songs.

in related news, grooveshark has caused me to realize that pedro the lion's achilles heel comes closest to summarizing my own personal theology than anything else i've read or heard lately. please enjoy a selection below.

the fleecing:


foregone conclusions:

can we all just agree that grooveshark is totally amazing?

seriously, dudes! i am still not sure how grooveshark works (probably witchcraft and/or magic, like most things on the internons) but what i do know is that you can type a song title or artist or album name into a box and then it will play the song for you. you should probably try it out right now.

a truly excellent movie (nsfw unless you have a dinosaur hookup-positive, marijuana-friendly workplace. [hey, it's 2009; anything is possible.])

this movie made my morning:



The Whitest Kids U' Know "The Dinosaur Rap"

this is an amazing movie.

it starts a little slow but then it gets amazing, i promise.



fr. eckle studios...um...dancing? i guess? to daft punk's "better harder faster stronger"

heima is a beautiful film.

today at work we screened heima: a film by sigur rós. and i was reminded again of what a beautiful film it is. if you have not seen it, i would definitely recommend it.

sigur rós, after becoming really famous and spending more than a year on the road, decided that they wanted to return to their home country of iceland and play a series of free, unannounced concerts. heima is footage of those shows, interviews with the band (they are endearingly modest and shy), and incredible scenery of iceland.

here is the trailer. i hope that you like it:



heima trailer, sigur rós

can we all just agree that karaoke is excellent?

because it is. b.f.h. and i started the evening off right with "girls just wanna have fun," and along the way we got in "livin' on a prayer" (which caused me to realize that many classic rock songs have choruses that are super fun to sing and quite well-known, and verses that are neither. you've been warned), "bohemian rhapsody," and "take my breath away" (i went for the high notes, and i'm not sorry.) we finished with "time after time." it was quite an evening.

next time, madonna.

can we all just agree that "ariodante" is a totally ridiculous opera? (spoiler alert!)

a little while ago i got a free ticket to a preview performance of "ariodante." it was really fun to get to see the show, the costumes were cool, and most of the singing was pretty good too...but the plot was unlike any classical opera i've ever seen.

the body count: one. only one. (WHEN DOES THIS EVER HAPPEN IN AN OPERA?)

the bad guy: he ended up being the one who died. he was slain by the older brother of the protagonist, and get this: he confessed his entire nefarious plot as he was dying offstage, and he apologized for it.

the lovers #1 (the pair who couldn't stop singing about how happy they were and how great things were and how the heavens smiled upon their union): things worked out fine, even though it looked for awhile like it was going to be a romeo and juliet situation, because she thought he had died and was going to kill herself and then it turns out he wasn't dead but he takes a billion years to shut up and go tell her.

the lovers #2 (the pair where the man was hopelessly devoted to the woman even though she was head over heels for the bad guy who was, of course, just using her): also come out just fine! she realizes that she loves him after all, or something!

also, several key male roles were played by women, and it confused the heck out of me because it was hard to remember who was who anyway. and that is what happened.