Minor Rant

Raise your hand if, when you think NASCAR, you think of Sheryl Crow.

Right. So why in the hell is she headlining a Dale Earnhardt Tribute Concert?

The best thought I can come up with is that she and Dale Jr. were chasing each other around in the video for "Steve McQueen," and they got to be friend. It could also have something to do with her increasing celebrity whoredom.

I've been a big Sheryl Crow fan for years, but I've been increasingly disappointed with her lately. Her last album was a big disappointment to me (especially considering how good the two before it were), and her public persona seems to be getting dumber by the second.

She does seem to be a fairly intelligent person, but every interview I read with her, she just sounds more and more vapid. I joke sometimes that they must have accidentally removed a chunk of her brain when she got a facelift, though that's not necessarily fair.

I don't know that she got a facelift, although the fact that she looks significantly younger now than she did three years ago cannot be entirely attributed to airbrushing and wearing more revealing clothes.

The thing is, as much as this frustrates me, it also makes me feel a bit guilty, because I'm acting like a) I actually have control over her actions and b) I, as a fan, should have some say in the way she presents herself, and have a piece of some collective ownership of her image.

Because when I identify myself as a huge Sheryl Crow fan, people look to her current album to see what I admire, not the brilliant work she's done in the past, which is what I actually do admire.

And it makes me sad that what used to stand for artistry and great songwriting now stands for Jeep commercials and frolicing on the beach in booty shorts.

One of the reasons I was drawn to Crow in the first place is that she seems like the type of person who likes to do her own thing. And so help me, if dressing up the exterior and dumbing down what people can see of the interior is what she wants to do, so be it.

As long as it's her decision.

The thing that bothers me about this recent change is that it seems like she's doing it, either because her record company asked her to or because she decided to do it before they did, to prevent herself from becoming irrelevant.

I couldn't think of a quicker path to irrelevance than making more pandering, half-ass albums like C'mon C'mon instead of the brilliant work she did on The Globe Sessions and her self-titled album, and then cashing in for millions on the songs that don't completely suck.

I don't know. I guess C'mon C'mon jumped the shark for me when I hit "You're An Original," recorded with none other than Lenny Kravitz, the Least Original Man In Rock And Roll (Including John Tesh). Shit like that really bugs the hell out of me.

Bah. I guess I didn't really realize how pissed I was about all this until I vented. I do apologize to anyone who's not a music fan, but if your favorite band has ever done something that really honks you off, you know how I feel.

An Excellent Way To Waste Time

It appears that this site is no longer posting stuff, because if it was, I'd permananetly add it to the Fun Wastes Of Time section. However, going through the archives is great fun: The Inexplicable Object Of The Week.

Entertaining Conversation

So, still at the blues bar I was applying for a job at, I had a slightly surreal conversation with the guy who was doing the hiring.

Before I get into the story, I didn't get hired yet, and nothing's going to happen until Mama, the owner, gets back from Italy on the 20th, and he talks to the rest of the staff about whether they can accomodate another bartender.

Anyway, they were having a jam session, and this guy Harmonica Khan got up on stage. Little old black dude, looked a little crazy, but I tend to give crazy-looking musicians the benefit of the doubt, because many of them are, in fact, a little nuts, but still cool people.

Now, bear in mind that I consider this to be more of a humorous than threatening situation when you read the conversation. Of course, I have a really sick sense of humor, so that might contribute.

Anyway, Tony, the guy, was telling me about the various guys jamming when the follwing conversation occured. This is not our exact conversation, because my memory's not that good, but it's a fairly accurate facsimile.

Tony: Yeah, the harmonica player just got out of jail after 26 years.
Me: 26 years? For what?
Tony: Oh, he killed some guy in a fight.

(pause)

Me: Well, that'll do it.
Tony: Yeah, he had mentioned when I booked him he just got out of jail, but he didn't say for what. And when they don't say, I don't ask, 'cause I don't wanna know.
Me: Understandable.
Tony: Here's how I found out...

And he handed me a copy of the Chicago Reader, which had this story about his situation. It's an interesting little article, but I hope for society's sake 26 years in the clink cleansed Mr. Khan's soul of any need for troublemaking...

Like I said, for some reason, the whole situation was much more funny than weird to me, although it's certainly an aspect of the interview that I'll leave out when I talk to my parental units about it. Somehow, I doubt they'd be comforted by this anecdote.

It definitely seems like a fun place to work, but hopefully by the 20th I'll have some gainful employment. Otherwise, it could turn out to be a really interesting job.

Quotable Quotes

"Hey Tony, my girlfriend wants to name our dog Castro...'cause he has no balls!" -Random bar patron, to the guy I was interviewing with at the blues bar.

"Hmm, these are good, but they're expensive. I think I'll just eat this cheese instead." -Adam, reenacting his thought process about Atkins shakes.

Yay!

Heard back from a couple places today. We'll see how it pans out. I don't wanna jinx anything, so I won't go into too much detail here, but I think (knock wood, cross fingers, avoid black cats, etc) the tide may be turning in my favor....We shall see.

That's Bullshit

Scott Wheeler, my old nemesis who got busted for having himself mailed a whole lotta weed and possession of other drugs, is not going to jail. He pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and is getting off with 2 years probation, a $500 fine, and 240 hours of community service.

Okay, this dumbfuck had over three ounces of marijuana (less than I initially had heard, but still, even my friend who smoked her way out of school was only smoking an ounce a week, and she was smoking eight times a day) shipped to his real address, in his real name.

He also got caught with a gram of cocaine, and four grams of hallucinogenic 'shrooms. That's a pretty big stash there, pal. Most people would go to jail for that.

Scotty boy, however, is rich and white. Call me a bleeding-heart liberal if you will (Dave, I'm looking at you here), but if he hadn't been both of these, he would have gone to jail. Maybe not for the maximum, but he would have done at least a year.

Instead, he's back home serving probation with mommy, waiting to hear when mommy's lawyers can successfully sue to get him back into the University so he can come irritate the shit out of everyone again.

Ah, justice.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I am so glad I graduated.

Scales

Since I decided to go on a diet, I figured I probably ought to have an accurate scale.

The one that has inhabited my apartment for the last few months has this unfortunate tendency to tell you different weights (10-15 pounds lighter or heavier) depending on how you stand on it. I bought it for four bucks at Target over the summer, so it figures.

It does give me false encouragement every once in a while, telling me I've randomly dropped 10 pounds between trips to the evil beast, although this is pretty much impossible given the laws of physics.

Conversely, it probably erroneously discourages me as well, which is a nice thought, but I'd much rather have an accurate reading than sit around playing Guess My Own Weight. Because when it's just me, I can't win a stuffed animal.

I went and bought the fifteen buck model this afternoon. Hopefully this one will give me something resembling an accurate reading of my weight. Although I'm not sure I want to know my accurate weight at this point...

However, if I do end up losing weight, I would like to know the exact measure of my success. It does help to be encouraged, ya know.

But It's Die! With A T!

I'm going on a diet. The Atkins Diet, to be more precise.

Yes, that crazy diet where you eat next to no carbs and eat a hell of a lot of meat and vegetables. Yes, I am insane. Thanks for asking!

No, really. I do have my reasons for choosing this particular avenue of attempted weight loss. And here's a few:

1. Adam, my roommate, did Atkins a couple years ago and lost about 60 pounds, and has kept it off since. I've talked to a few other folks who did it and they've all said it's not nearly as hard to keep the weight off as with other diets.

2. Despite the fact that I'm fairly restricted in what I can eat, I can eat however much of it I want. Granted, I'm probably not going to want to eat more than one bunless bacon cheeseburger a day, but at least I'm not going to feel like I'm starving myself, as I have when I've tried other ways of cutting back.

3. I need to prove to myself that the control I showed when I quit drinking for a month can extend to food. I've never been really good at controlling how or what I eat, and I think if I can pull off this crazy diet for a month, I can do really well with other stuff.

The shit of it is, I have to quit drinking again. Alcohol, especially beer, has carbs aplenty, and is thus out for a bit.

I've decided to start this Friday, and do it for a month. This theory also has its reasons. I decided to start Friday because I'm told the first few days where ketosis (burning of fat instead of carbs) starts to kick in can make you feel pretty sluggish.

I'd rather feel blah on a weekend than when I'm looking for a job and trying to convince people of my pep and energy during the week. And at the rate things have been going lately, I'm certainly not going to have a job by this weekend anyway.

Also, because I'm doing it for a month and can't drink while I do the diet, I wanted to start as soon as possible so that I will be good to go by March 17th for my first St. Patrick's day in Chicago as a legal alcohol imbiber.

Because you have to have your priorities.

Another reason I'm starting now is that I realized that if I don't do something about how overweight I am soon, this is going to be a major problem for the rest of my life. My main goal is to get back under 200 pounds, something I haven't done for several years.

I want to at least go from Morbidly Obese to Medically Obese. I joke about being a fatass a lot, but I'm sick of being so fat I can't find a goddamn thing my size. I don't want to be a stick, but it'd sure be nice to walk up 3 flights of stairs without getting winded.

I think partly I'm also starting now so that I feel like I'm at least doing something useful with my life. I feel like I've hit major roadblocks in the employment, romance, and general usefulness departments, after weeks of sitting around unemployed.

I swore to my parents I wasn't going to need their help after I graduated, and it absolutely kills me that I still have to ask my dad for money. Obviously, this doesn't stop me from doing it, but it's just frustrating and contributes to my feelings of failure.

It's kind of a dumb reason to lose weight, but I want to prove that I can at least do something other than take up space.

But at the very least, I'll take up less space.

Stupid Groundhog!

Punxsatawney Phil saw his shadow. Six more bloody weeks of winter.

And no, I do not subscribe to the alternative groundhogs, General Beauregard Lee, the Southern groundhog, or Buckeye Chuck, the Ohio groundhog. The mere fact that these alternahogs exist and are reported on are testimony to the sheer stupidity of Americans as a group.

Individually, we may be smart. Collectively, we believe that rodents can accurately forecast the weather.

At least my heat works now. So well, in fact, that I'm surprised everything plastic in my room hasn't melted. I'm sure as shit not complaining about this problem, however. I'd rather melt than freeze. Plus, when it's hot you can crack a window. Five blankets wasn't cutting it in the cold.

Weird

Well, for some reason, when I woke up Saturday, I wasn't sick anymore, at least not virus-sick. Watching CNN all day yesterday (Living in a cave? Read this.) was not the greatest idea to improve my mental health, but that wasn't really to be helped.

It was very, very strange. I had felt so sick all day Thursday and Friday, I thought this weekend was going to be a total waste. I had gone to the health service only to be told that it was probably a viral infection (and that it wasn't anemia or mono).

Going to the health service was an adventure in and of itself. It's only about a half mile walk, but there and back I felt like I had just walked four miles each way. All they gave me was some decongestants and good wishes, and took $105 and two vials of blood.

After the tremendous physical exertion of making my bed Friday night, I laid down on it and couldn't get up for 10 minutes because I was so tired. It bit.

Then Saturday, as soon as I got up, I felt a thousand times better. No reason, just felt fine, all of a sudden.

It was especially weird to feel so much better physically while feeling kind of depressed. I consider myself something of a space nerd, although my nerddom is more confined to the Apollo-era space program. I probably know more about the Mercury program than about the Shuttle era.

I don't remember a damn thing about Challenger other than the videos I've seen replayed (I was four and a half when it happened), so it was really weird to see something like the reverse of those videos playing out over and over and over again on CNN all day.

But eventually, I turned off the television, because I just couldn't watch anymore, and I decided to feel decent about feeling better, because there wasn't a damn thing I could do otherwise.