A Strange Familiar Land

  We had wandered into a strange land where everything was familiar but different than how we had left it.  A land of old, old women with fading tattoos; Celtic symbols on their hands and cryptic words winding round their bodies.  The women wore their once long hair cropped short, as long hair looked misplaced when you were old.  It was a land of old, old men with saggy ears, tired of carrying long forgotten gauges.  The men wore comfortable cardigans with tiny metal studs in their shoulders to show they still hadn't lost their edge, still hadn't sold out.  And let me tell you, in this strange land these old, old men and old, old women they were hardened by all the years they had seen go by, but baby, when they smiled, oh when they smiled how it lit up a room so completely.  And on Sunday nights, when they'd put their music on the stereo, oh how those smiles shined.

Another Winter Break Begins

Home again for yet another Winter break, possibly the last. Well it's only the last because I'm a senior, if I graduate, there's no more after this. I am back to this house full of soft carpets and level floors and a happy dog, with my head cloudy from being sick. Five weeks of reading. Five weeks of movies. Five weeks of holidays. Five weeks of whatever. Tomorrow in particular my family and I are driving to Wisconsin to celebrate Thanksgiving there. I'm excited to see all my cousins and eat tons of food and relax if there's time for it. Sweet smells of pumpkin pie and cranberries, succulent turkeys roasting.

Overall here are some things I have decided I want to try to do overbreak:

     1) Read some books <--simple enough right?

     2) Watch some movies <--hopefully going to catch up on some I've missed this year, and some new ones in theaters

    3) Get New Walking Shoes and Dancing Shoes <--both would make life easier

    4) Make an End of the Year Music List

    5) Try to go Swing Dancing at least once or twice

    6) Beat the video games I've been working on  <-- summer projects are now winter projects

    7) Keep watching Doctor Who <-- I've been watching on Netflix recently, pretty hooked

    8) Write more <-- my well of inspiration ran a little dry when I got really busy, so hopefully I can fix that

    9) Keep track of concerts coming into the Cleveland area

  10)  Maybe finally change the layout of this blog 

  11) Add more to this list

Musical Preferences

You know what I think is important? Finding out the type of bands/music that you specifically like. Each person is different, and everyone has a slightly different taste in music, if not all forms of art, etc. If you like what's played on your local pop radio station, that's great! If you only like music that consists of cricket chirps and mandolin, well that probably exists somewhere and that is great too! But what I think is important, is to sit down and think about your musical taste preferences.

  Do you like ambient noise? Yes? No? Maybe? Do you think country songs are the bee's knees? Maybe you're secretly into 70's folk music and you just haven't found out yet!  Do you need some chugging bass lines and sultry voices in your life? Grimey hip-hop with super fast rapping? Bands with 30 person harmonies? You might like that! Or maybe Noise with abrasive sounds cutting every which way! Classic Hair-Metal Bands from the 80's? Mo-Town? Maybe you only like to listen to Toto? Do you like Punk-Ska tunes? Give 'em a try maybe you'll enjoy. Afro-Cubano Jazz? Electro-Pop? Do you think Frank Sinatra was the best singer to come around? Poppy love songs? Do you enjoy steel drums tinkling in the background? Justin Bieber hitting high notes? Toe-tappingly fun tunes? Mix-tapes from your best friends?

  The point is there is a lot out there, tons and tons of songs, thousands of bands, endless variety. Don't be afraid to dig a little deeper. But on the same note, whatever you like is all right and don't let anyone tell you differently.  Not one person. Just enjoy what you enjoy.  I can't imagine my life without music, without sound, I think its something important to have in your life.

Now how bout for some African inspired pop music with Hebrew vocals?

Fool's Gold
Surprise Hotel



Now I hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!

Tiny Town

   Then tiny town sat perched upon a hill, rolling green grass in all directions.  To the north was a fine lake, good for fishing or boating.  There was a coal mine to the East, far off.  Encircling the entirety of the town was a wonderful train track, shining brand-new.  Who lived in this picturesque town?  No one, not a puppy, nor a mail-man; though there did happen to be a post office that boasted "Rain, snow or shine, we shall deliver!"on a gold plaque on the front door.  And although there was not a person in the town the grass on the surrounding hill was impeccably well kept, as if an ever vigilant grounds' keeper took the train in each evening to look after the grass.  Fore the train did run twice each evening, promptly at 6:00 pm and then again at 8:00pm.

  There was no groundskeeper taking the train each evening, but the town was loved.  Not from inside, but from outside.  A man took care of this town as if it were his own child; cleaning each structure with a fine brush, painting here and there, outfitting different cars for the train-track, quietly adding to the outskirts of town: buildings or trees or bits of grass.  He was the one who ran the train twice daily, oh how proud he was when the train rain, chugging through the minuscule landscape.

Scorching

  The heat was scorching, utterly suffocating, it seared you clear to the bone sending screams of agony from your throat.  And with the sound of your own voice calling out you wake up startled then absolutely relieved to find yourself in bed and not consumed by flames. The relief washes over you like a wave, cleansing, calming you down 'til you can breath easy once more. You pat the sheets and mattress around you, fluff the pillows and try to get back to sleep.  You're almost comfortable once again, you're wary that the dream might return, but you're tired. You're almost asleep asleep when you smell something burning; something burnt.

   Jumping out of bed without a thought, you are like an animal filled with nothing but panic and terror: your need to survive is absolute. You get to your door, the knob isn't hot yet, but you smell smoke. Quick! Hurry before things get bad. You scurry through the house with hardly a thought for personal possessions. Through the backdoor you roll onto the the dew covered grass of the backyard, escaping deftly as the house becomes engulfed.

Torrential Nostalgia

  I just got home after trekking a mile through the pouring rain.  I had neglected to bring my umbrella this morning, even though upon opening the door I had a gut feeling a storm was coming.  Of I went anyway with the hope I would return home before any rain hit and everything would be fine.

    Like any well made plan or hope this one came apart at the seams.  I ended up spending a little too long at the Library and while time vanished, the water began to fall down from the grey clouds. What could I do but walk home anyway? I couldn't wait forever, so off I went.

   Upon exiting the Library I thought, wow, this Autumn has been much rainier than in years past.  But then I looked back and realized that wasn't quite true.  I ran cross country and we competed in the fall.  The thing you could count on without fail was that the weather would be dismal for at least a few of the meets we attended.  These meets then usually consisted of bundling in layers and futilely trying to find some scrap of dryness under a tent or tree or anywhere.  You shivered and counted down the minutes until you'd have to compete.  Then the time would come and you stood shivering alongside another a hundred other shivering bodies.  Each person trying to stay warm, doing quick wind sprints, jumping up and down to keep the blood flowing.

    With a BOOM!  the gun goes off, everyone shoots off, rain pouring down from above, mud splattering everywhere from below.  The teams go from athletes to muddy monsters in minutes, battling the elements as much as each other. The course becomes unpredictable, a firm bit of trail could now be a muddy sinkhole up to your knee.  There's no stopping, you just keep going til you reach the finish line no matter what.

  Those days may sound miserable, and they were, but they were also the most fun you could have while running.  It was exhilarating, it was messy and it was awesome.

Hanging in Mid-Air

   In his dream Henry noticed a sort of hole hanging in mid-air.  He'd never noticed such a thing in one of his dreams before; it was odd.  The rest of the dream was fairly ordinary, a schoolyard with a playground, trees on the outskirts.  The hole was no bigger than the middle of a dough-nut and it hung there, slightly different than all the air around it.  Henry tried putting both of his index fingers in and pulling: it worked!  The hole began to expand.  Henry continued to pull the hole of dream space apart until it was about the size of an open window.  He looked out of the "window" only to see blue skies, with white here and there.

 "Well if this is a dream, going through this window won't hurt me no matter how hard or far I fall", Henry thought as he then crawled his way through the the different bit of air.

    Henry tumbled through the hole out into the cold air and started to fall.  What he hadn't realized was the hole was a hole in the fabric of the dream itself which in fact led back to reality.  The ground below was in fact very real, luckily Henry's tumbling form was aimed for a sizable mound of snow on the side of a mountain.  A mountain which happened to be part of the Pyrenees. Henry didn't land with a painful "THUD" so much as a softer "WHUMP" as a cloud of untouched white snow exploded snow exploded about him. He lazed dazed in the snow as the sun began to rise on the horizon.

                   ======================

And now here's a song I've really been digging with a pretty cool music video. It probably could have also been shown as a Halloween spooky video, but ah well.

M83
Midnight city

a perfect profile

Half the moon hung in the sky
       a perfect profile
Glowing ever so bright in the night
   I glanced up as I was walking,
So surprised was I, so surprised,
   to see the half-moon wink for me
I gasped, I cried out, I chuckled
  And oh! how I winked back