"Don't Let It Bring You Down" - Neil Young

From BBC studios, February 23 1971

More Webspace Junk

During the last 12-16 months I have increasingly thought about have my own little web space. For what they are worth, I dig Blogger and Wordpress, or at least their free versions. I have used them and enjoyed them for going on three years now.

It is just that I want a little more.

I like the idea of having a url that doesn't also involve those companies names. I like the idea of looking more professional. I like the idea of having a place that is mine, and mine only. I really like the idea of creating something unfettered by the various rules and regulations those companies add to their free accounts.

The main, basic problem was the time I was ready to commit to such a thing I was also jobless. Sure I had a nice severance package from the place that laid me off, sure I had a few temporary jobs in between, but there was nothing full-time and permanent that told me I could go ahead and make a monthly commitment to something I was basically already getting for free.

It is only now, here in China that we have a steady income and works and thus I am buying the space.

I don't really ever expect that the Midnight Cafe will ever turn me into a rich man. I don't think that I'll ever be able to quit a day job and be a full time blogger. I'll be overjoyed if the new site ever makes enough money to pay for itself.

I have a slew of ideas for the new blog - ways to fill it up every day, ideas to be creative and interesting and draw an audience - and I think I am going to be able to make it a place to go to everyday.

Friday I ordered the space. I got it through Cyberwurx, which comes recommended by friends and starts with a very reasonable plan. I swear the paperwork said that they'd have me going and even load up Wordpress into my space for me within 24 hours.

Well here I am two days this side of Friday and still I've gotten nothing - not even a welcome e-mail. It is driving me crazy. I got all excited about what I was going to do, what I was going to say and how it was going to look. And here I am still waiting.

As it was the weekend I've tried to give them the benefit of the doubt. It is easy to think internet companies are gigantic and provide 24 hour service, but in truth they may be small and they may not be staffed on weekend. So I'm trying to wait until the middle of Monday. This is also hard because here it is Monday evening, but in the States it is still early I will have to wait until Tuesday morning before I begin sending question e-mails.

So hopefully, dear readers, you will have something new by weeks end.

The Listening Room - Sept 23 2007

I'm slowly trying to get back into doing all my old features. Hopefully by the time I have my own webspace all things will be back to normal. Speaking of that, I did in fact order some space yesterday, but there seems to be some sort of trouble. Hopefully that will be resolved early this week and I'll be up and running real soon.

Until then here's a look at the music I've listened to over the last 24 hours. There aren't a lot of themes running here as I did a lot of shuffle mode.


Aretha Franklin | The Best of Aretha Franklin | Dr. Feelgood
Ben Folds | Songs For Silverman | Jesusland
Ben Kweller | On My Way | My Apartment
Billy Bragg | Album | The Marriage
Bob Dylan | Self Portrait | Let It Be Me
Bob Weir | Ace | Greatest Story Ever Told
Bright Eyes | I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning | At The Bottom Of Everything
Cowboy Junkies | The Trinity Session | Postcard Blues
Creedence Clearwater Revival | Chronicle Volume One | Bad Moon Rising
Dixie Chicks | Fly | Some Days You Gotta Dance
Don McLean | American Pie | Winterwood
Donna the Buffalo | 2005-10-15 State Theatre, Falls Church, VA | Funkyside
Dwight Yoakam | This Time | Fast As You
Ella Fitzgerald | The Jazz Collection Jazz Hits | Lover Come
Elvis Presley | Elvis Rocks Little Rock | Blue Suede Shoes
Emmylou Harris | Luxary Liner
The Folkswingers | The Acoustic Highway Collection | Walk Right In
Frank Sinatra | In The Wee Small Hours | I'll Never Be The Same
Frank Sinatra | May 22, 1968 - Oakland Coliseum | Nancy (With The Laughing Face)
Frente! | Marvin The Album | Bizarre Love Triangle
Gillian Welch | 5/19/03, Rio Theatre | Long Black Veil
Gillian Welch | 09/17/03 Calvin College, Grand Rapids, MI | Look At Miss Ohio
Gomez | Liquid Skin | Revolutionary Kind
Guy Clark, Joe Ely, John Hiatt & Lyle Lovett | 2004-01-30 | The Cape
Grateful Dead | Grateful Dead - 1987-03-22 - Hampton Va | El Paso
Howlin' Wolf | Chess Blues Classics | The Red Rooster
J Mascis + the Fog | Free So Free | Everybody Lets Me Down
Jeff Tweedy | Live At The Vic - March 5, 2005 | Someday Soon
The Jesus & Mary Chain | Stoned And Dethroned | Bullet Lovers
The Jesus & Mary Chain | Stoned And Dethroned | Come On
The Jesus & Mary Chain | Stoned And Dethroned | Dirty Water
The Jesus & Mary Chain | Stoned And Dethroned | Sometimes Always
Johnny Cash | Unearthed | Understand Your Man
Johnny Cash | Unearthed | No Earthly Good
Lucinda Williams | Car Wheels On A Gravel Road | Right In Time
Lyle Lovett | I Love Everybody | Sonja
Lyle Lovett | Live In Texas | Church
Martha Wainwright | Live on NPR (04/10/06) | Ball And Chain
Nanci Griffith | Other Voices, Too (A Trip Back to Bountiful) | You Were On My Mind
Neil Young | Unplugged | Mr. Soul
Old Crow Medicine Show | Big Iron World | Cocaine Habit
Old Crow Medicine Show | Big Iron World | Minglewood Blues
Pearl Jam | Chapters | Wash
Pearl Jam | 14 Le Colisee Pepsi 09/20/05 | Insignificance
Peter Gabriel | So | Sledgehammer
Peter Gabriel | Secret World Live | Red Rain
The Pogues | If I Should Fall From Grace With God | Turkish Song Of The Damned
Radiohead | Hail To The Thief | 2+2=5 (The Lukewarm)
R.E.M. | Fables of the Reconstruction | Maps And Legends
Rev. Gary Davis | The Other Anthology Of Folk Music | Twelve Gates to the City
Ricky Skaggs | Super Hits | Highwy 40 Blues
Rossini | Lone Ranger Soundtrack | William Tell Overture
Ryan Adams | 2006-12-5 The Town Hall - NYC, NY | Trains
Ryan Adams | Glasgow - Academy- 15 February 2006 | Rosebud
Ryan Adams | Stockholm Sweden 02-09-02 | La Cienega Just Smiled
Shirley Jones | The Music Man | Till There Was You
Simon & Garfunkel | Greatest Hits | Homeward Bound
Sonic Youth | Rather Ripped | James Run Free
Sufjan Stevens | Casimir Pulaski Demo
They Might Be Giants | Then - The Earlier Years | Don't Let's Start
They Might Be Giants | Then - The Earlier Years | Mr. Me
Townes Van Zandt | Chautaqua 8-29-90 | Marie
U2 | The Unforgettable Fire | Bad
Van Morrison | Pay the Devil | Playhouse
The White Stripes | Get Behind Me Satan | Take Take Take
Wilco | Murat - Indianapolis, June 15 2007 | Hate It Here
Wilco | A Ghost Is Born | I'm A Wheel
Willie Nelson | Milk Cow Blues | Night Life
Warren Zevon | Transverse City | Gridlock
Zen Tricksters | 2003-12-10 - Acoustic Cafe | All Night Long Blues

72 Simpsons Movie References

The Adventures of the Acordian Guy has set up a little Simpsons movie reference post. It works like the above pictures where he has the Simpsons scene on the left and the exact scene from the actual movie on the right.

I say scene like it shows a clip, but it is really just a picture. It is definitely cool to see all the classics (and a few I didn't know were actual parodies) but I do kind of wish it did include some clips. It would also be nice if it listed which Simpsons' episode it came from and the title of the movie.

Oh well, it is still a fun exercise.

Great Shanghai Picture

I didn't take this picture, and I'm afraid I don't know who did, but man, that's a nice shot.

(If you do happen to be the copyright owner, and don't want me posting it, or would like credit, drop me a line or make a comment.)

A Few Worlds On Margaret Atwood's The Robber Bride

I am a strange reader. At any given time I will be reading 3 or 4 or 10 books at a time. Often, without warning, right in the middle of a book I will stop reading it. Not intentionally mind you, for I don't think I've ever just put down a book and said "this is not worth my time," but I do often get distracted by something more interesting and then never return to the older book.

There is really no rhyme or reason to what books I read, or which ones I actually complete. I just go where my interests are at the moment. Nothing more.

A long time ago, call it the 90s, my first ever online friend kept recommending to me Margaret Atwood. Or, rather she kept asking me if I had read any of Atwoods books, and she often ended her e-mails with an Atwood quote. Still I never picked her up.

Sometime since then, and long after the friendship died (or withered away) I did pick up a copy of Atwood's The Robber Bride.

Still, it sat on the shelf for years.

Sometime before China I picked it up and began to read. I liked it. I liked it a lot and told my wife to read it. She did and she liked it a lot.

But because we were moving to China, and I was busy and I was reading other things, I went slowly through it.

Now, some three months after I picked it up, I finished it.

Brilliant. Amazing. Fabulous are words I might use to describe it. I don't really want to do a proper review, as I'm not sure I'd be able to do it justice, but I did want to say how much I really liked it.

It is part fairly tale and morality play and part meditation on what it is to be a woman and to be a friend. She splits the book into big chunks telling three separate yet similar stories in a variety of ways. It is the story of three very different women, who all have their men stolen from the by a singular woman.

It is not so much the stories that are interesting, but in the way that they are told. It is never written in the first person, but we see the world, at different times from the perspective of the three women. And the man-eater, Zenia is nothing more than a shadow, a shape-shifting witch, full of lies that rest on her own, unspecified whims. Each story tells us a little more about Zenia, yet we are never sure which parts to believe, if any at all.

I love a good yard. I adore a good story. But I get all drooly when a story is told in a different and interesting and imaginative way. Atwood does this to perfection.

Really, go read it. It's all worth it.

Interesting No Smoking Ad

This is apparently from a UAE paper which has been running a lot of interesting anti-smoking ads. Be forewarned some of the picks in the link may be slightly offensive to some.

Very Cool Picture Of The Night Sky From Death Valley

The pic is too big for me to show here, but click over and be amazed.

NY Times Giving Away 20 Years Worth Of Content

They've ended their pay program and decided to give their archives away! Now if I could just figure out something I wanted to look for.

View Of The Earth From Mars

That little dot is our little planet as seen from Mars. It's a small world afterall. Picture completely stolen borrowed from Nasa.