Love her

I remember the first time I listened to Tidal by Fiona Apple (which was years after it had originally been released) all the way through. It was amazing. So raw. I instantly loved her and have bought each album she has since released (all four in total). Her newest album just came out a couple of weeks ago and is just as wonderful as I expect out of her.

Being surrounded by professional musicians, there is no doubt of my musical ignorance. But still, every now and then I do come across some artist that does affect me, and Ms. Apple is one of them.

The other day I had my iPod shuffling through all songs whilst I cleaned and her “Extraordinary Machine” song came on. I had forgotten how great it was and thought I’d share it. It’s from the album of the same title that was released in 2005:

-K

Apple products rule the world

But I’m more concerned with the candy-asses who may buy something just because it’s the newest, prettiest thing. Have you heard about Apple’s new model? The MacBook Pro with Retina display.

It’s nice. It’s gorgeous actually. But you know what it costs? The base price is $2,200.00 and that is a whole lot of cash.
You may be okay with that. It also has a significant decrease in battery life, which you may also be okay with having. After all, part of the beauty of macs is how easily replaceable their parts are. Back in my college days, one could easily defend the cost of buying a Mac notebook or desktop because the memory, battery, etc. we’re all easily fixed or upgraded.

This is apparently no longer true.

Go ahead and read that link. It’s short. I’ll wait.

…
Can you believe it??? Well over two thousand dollars for a laptop that is absolutely guaranteed to die within two or three years. I’d have a hard time dealing with that.
I don’t mind buying items that have a set life expectancy. I bought my iPad2 almost a year and a half ago for $700.00 and I use the ever-loving shit out of it. I love it. And when it eventually kicks the bucket, as it will since it has the same fused-casing problem as the new Pro, I’ll be okay with it as I didn’t invest too much money and I will have gotten tons of use out of it. But there is no way that I could justify spending an easy twenty-five hundred dollars for a two-ish year computer.

But I am a bit worried. I foresaw us buying a Mac laptop for Ben next year as his current (non-Mac) one is nearly five years old and if The People buy enough of the new Pro, the old one will no longer be available. And I will have a really hard time trying to convince him to spend almost three times the amount he did on his current laptop on one that will die out in half the amount of time.

So, I guess what I’m saying is, spread the word. Because no matter how cool Apple’s commercials may be, they will never explain this little bit of money-making magic to you.

-K

My Geek Flag Only Flies So Far

Anyone who knows me knows I love Batman. Hell, my downstairs bathroom is my “Bat-room” as I’ve put all sorts of Batman-themed memorabilia in it and painted the walls yellow with black and blue towels as if it belonged to a seven year old boy.
And anyone who has spoken to me about Batman knows my feelings about Nolan’s universe of Batman where Christian Bale speaks like a big bad wolf, driving a tank that would never be considered by a respectable Bruce Wayne, feeling nothing like a comic book movie should.

But I still love Batman.

This morning I finally got around to readingthe most unsettling comic news I’ve heard in awhile.

There is so much bad news in this article I don’t even know where to begin:
*Justice League fucking blows; they’re not badass enough as a group
*A Logan’s Run remake?!? STOP WITH THE FUCKING REMAKES!!!
*Lethal Weapon 5?! STOP RUINING PERFECTLY GOOD FRANCHISES (see also how terrified I am at the upcoming fuckup that will be Bladerunner 2)
*They’re recasting everybody?? Bad call, Dudes In Charge
*A Mad Max “reboot” –really?!? Someone said this is a good idea?
*No one likes Superman because he has no faults. This is why all Superman movies suck.
*Individual movies for Flash, Wonder Woman, and Lobo?!? Seriously??

I have a hard time believing that anyone will be excited about any of this news. Bad calls around.
-K

Shear Day!!!

Poor Attila got a summer haircut today. He probably feels better, but I doubt he’ll tell me.

He lost so much fur!!

I fucking love living in the future*

Dude. A watch that syncs with your Apple devices?? (or Android)

I mean, it is a bit overkill to have, but I am totally geeked out over how awesome it is that we even have this technology!!

fucking badass watch

*Yes, I know I’ve been MIA for awhile and I’m going to try more stream-of-consciousness blogging rather than waiting and collecting photos and planning a thematic post etc. etc. that I eventually become so bogged down in what I should have been writing about that I just stop posting altogether as I’m too mentally overwhelmed. Wish me luck.

The south is nice and all…

But sometimes I am so ashamed of my state. Once again the “Don’t Say Gay” bill is working its way through the Tennessee legislature.
This is the most ridiculous bill I have heard of in quite awhile. All it will support is the further stigmatization of gay people; a group who already feels out of place in the majority of the bible belt.

Here is the latest local news article about this bullshit bill: (I’m having trouble with the hyperlink. Sorry.)

http://www.wbir.com/rss/article/206082/2/Dont-Say-Gay-bill-advances

-K

Let’s Talk About Facebook…

…doesn’t that sound like fun?

I have an ongoing internal debate with myself over the social networking site that has raging for years. Earlier last week I read that the company will soon be going public and since then I have been thinking about closing my Facebook down (but I think about doing this at least twice a year).

The problem is the pros of having a Facebook are really really great. But there are so very many cons to keeping it.

Reasons to get rid of my Facebook page:
-Too many baby pictures
-Too many wedding pictures
-Too many people hating their job
-Too many people hating their life
-Too many people talking about their babies
-Too many people talking about how much the love their partner
-Too many people talking about being irritated with their partner
-Too many people complaining about not having a partner
-Too many “Jesus” posts: prayers/pleas/thanks/encouragement/etc.
-Too many posts deliberately instigating all the Jesus people
-Too many posts politically charged (in either direction)
-Too many posts about sports/tv/awards/celebrities
-It will force me to reach out to my friends in real life a whole
lot more.
-Too many “life obligation friends:” distant relatives, work
people, friends of friends that I may see socially a few times
a year, relatives I see annually or do not like, etc..

Generally, I’m just annoyed by Facebook. I am not a people person, I do not like most people, and, honestly I would much rather be alone than with most people. And really, as much as I love the narcissistic aspect of “look at how awesome I am!” I do not like actually putting some of that stuff out into the gigantic internet void.

Reasons to keep my Facebook page:
-I like the ease and simplicity of keeping up with my “real life”
friends: seeing photos, weekend plans, etc..
-It makes party-planning and concert-inviting incredibly easy.
-I’ve reconnected with old friends with whom I’ve lost touch.
-We have distant plans of opening an etsy store and the social
networking business aspect is most-likely needed.

Obviously if we are tallying these as a scoresheet, my Facebook page will be terminated immediately. But the positive side of Facebook has a much stronger pull than nearly all of the negatives. Last year in the post-holiday moving mess, I abandoned Facebook for almost three solid weeks and I didn’t miss it all that much.

What I have been seriously considering this past week is scaling back my Facebook in a major way; taking down most of my pictures, not posting directly onto my wall (just letting twitter fill it), getting rid of all my information except one email address, and other less participatory things like that. I have a Twitter account, I have this blog, I have three active email addresses, I just don’t need Facebook. And keeping it that way still allows me to issue event invites/reply to event invites, keep in touch with out-of-town friends that I really do enjoy interacting with even in such a small superficial way, and allows me to keep the account open for the eventual store page/ads. It would also mean that I no longer have to be such a fucking German about who I let into my Friends list (because I refuse to do the “hide” thing or the different group things just on principle). And, by not posting directly to my wall, it will push me to post more on here–even if it is random internet finds I wander across.

I have very nearly talked myself into doing this over the past two or three days…we will see what happens. Do you like your Facebook page?

-K