I’m kind of obsessed with this song lately.  I first heard it when my friend played it on his radio show one night.  The singer’s voice sounded familiar, and the pianist clearly had classical chops.  I was mesmerized, and I called my friend at the station to find out who that was.  It turned out to be a new song by Regina Spektor called “Machine.”

The song’s subject matter and the detached quality of Regina’s perfomance always remind me of a beautiful, enigmatic and very dark anime series called Serial Experiments:  Lain, which I recommend whole-heartedly, although I would add the caveat that its darkness and strangeness is not for everyone; certainly not for the faint of heart.

[UPDATE:  Click on the picture, and that will take you to the first episode of the show.]

In other news, I spent this last weekend at the coast for a much-needed getaway.  It allowed me, among other things, the luxury of enough time away from all of the usual nonsense, so that I could cut out the noise and think about the people and things that are important to me, and one of them was this blog.  I needed some time away from it to appreciate how much I enjoy having this particular outlet, and you’ll be glad to know that I plan to write much more often, like I used to.

The hiatus is officially over.

In no particular order (Actually, they’re in reverse chronological order):

veni, vedi, vici

not quite there yet

Ethiopian wedding

Hydrox

George Harrison

beach trip

halfway through

the mental game of music

synchronicity

still don’t smoke

quite a group

lovely day in Seattle

Amen

happy as we are, thank you

Silver Falls

Port Townsend trip

dream girl

non-nostalgic nostalgia

wedding, play, garden, hike, learning

Of Yakima and Feces

the Oriental Chicken

Catherine Burton (Bunton?), R.I.P.

Oceanside

mona lisa

lots of big musical news, and links galore

a very coherent narrative

what if it is?

apples and bananas

cello scrotum

by way of example

flirtation versus pedantry

communication breakdown

Enjoy!

First of all, I’d like to say that I hope you’re having a Merry Christmas and a great holiday season.  I’d also like to thank you for reading BFS&T all this time, and for bearing with me through the hiatus.  And speaking of BFS&T, it celebrated its third anniversary a couple of weeks ago.  Let’s all raise a glass of some sis-boom-bah for that.

I should mention that I’m in Seattle for the holiday week, and that this will only be a short entry, but I did want to share with you the new insult I learned today.  I overheard it on a kids’ show that my niece was watching.   A boy band of sorts was trying to put on a Christmas concert, and a policeman was harassing them and trying to thwart the concert, and one of the guys in the band referred to him as a ‘blowhole.’  As in, “Hey, shut your piehole, you blowhole!”

I think that’s going to be my new favorite insult from now on.  I love it because it sounds a bit risque and naughty without actually being naughty.  Adam Carolla’s clever portmanteau ‘jackhole’ works the same way.   ‘Manhole’ is similarly not-naughty, but in that context it just sounds all kinds of wrong.  So ‘blowhole’ is perfect.

You’re welcome.  And Merry Christmas.

I wish I could embed this video, but the link will have to do.  It’s a short animated illustration of an excerpt of one of Alan Watts‘ lectures, and it’s absolutely brilliant.

LIFE AND MUSIC

I’m still on a mini-sabbatical from blogging, but there’s lots to tell you about if I felt so inclined.  Mixing for IrishBand, two gigs in Portland and Seattle (okay, here’s a picture from the Seattle show). . .

. . .opening up for the amazing Cirkestra, a fantastic day of music, dinner and the Oregon Symphony with the lovely and talented JapanesePianist, and for the next few days I’m taking a surprise trip to Northern California.  As soon as I get back, it’s into the studio with MellowBand.

But like I said, I’m still on sabbatical, so I’m not gonna elaborate on any of that stuff.  Sorry.

See you when I get home from NorCal.  Hopefully I’ll be in more of a writing mood by then.

You know it’s been a long time since you’re written an entry when you start to get messages from your friends that say, “You haven’t updated your blog in nine days.”

Yeah, I know.

I’m still alive and well, just kinda lying low on the blog front for a while.  I’ve been at this for quite a while now, you know.  This incarnation of BFS&T is coming up on its third anniversary, and I had the one on Blogger for a year before that, and the one on MySpace for two years before that.  It’s safe to say that I’ve paid my dues to the blogosphere.

I’ve been toying with the idea of a new approach, and I’ve been looking at some different options for platforms, and templates, and all of that sort of thing.  I’m hoping to find something that is as detailed as this is, while still allowing me to customize the template a bit more.

The name will stay the same, naturally.  Whatever I find will have to be able to be transferred to this domain name.  At this point, there’s one that does stand out among the others, but I’ve only recently started looking and comparing.

I’m spending Thanksgiving with the couple who used to host the play-reading group.  On the bigger holidays, they have dinner parties in which they invite a group of their friends who are either single, or have families who live elsewhere, or maybe they’re just interesting people in general.  Always a different group, and always fun.  So that’s where I’ll be.

I’ll be around.

I hope all’s well with you.