In the most minor of workplace annoyances, I made a cup of coffee at work, but someone turned off the kettle I had turned on and I wound up with an 85° degree cup of bean water.

The Astros-Yankees ALCS Game 2 is going to go down as one of my favorite all-time games. I’ve watched it three times since it was played. So many tense moments.

• Big Fan of Austin Wintory since he scored “Journey”. His recent album “Remnants” is really good. A series of short, well-executed tracks.
• Also really feeling Melanie Martinez’s new album “K-12” . It’s angst-pop in high form.
• In the late-90s, a bunch of big nineties bands teamed up to put our a really good album of Doors covers. (Supposedly, making the case that he could cover “The End” was why Scott Weiland put “Atlanta” on No. 4). The album was really good, and included a couple previously-unreleased Doors tracks. I owned it back then, but I lost it in a series of moves in the mid 2000s. Good news! It’s cheap on ebay!
• I recently read (in the modern sense of a mix of reading and listening to) “Under Pressure: The Final Voyage of Submarine S-Five” by AJ Hill, which was absolutely phenomenal. I’d read it years ago, but revisited after hearing the recent replay of a [Stuff You Missed in History Class][symich] Episode
• I picked up this Tripp-Lite KVM to simplify my home office. It lists 100hz refresh rate, but I have it working at 120hz reliably with my PC. Currently have three computers connected to one monitor through it (PC, MacMini, 13” MacBoom Pro). Much better than my old setup of switching monitor inputs then tickling a USB switch to get the input and active computer to match.

Iain found a katydid on the back window

Iain: “Can I eat him?” Linds: “No” Iain: “But he looks like chives”

Shirley Manson talks to Karen O about Maps. It’s like this particular episode of the Jump was made for me. Heroes talking about what might be my favorite song full stop.

We’re wondering: What will be the next indie trend from the past that will be big right now? Our immediate thought was chillwave, just because it’s been about a decade since it was the trendy form of indie. And there were probably a lot of 13 and 14-year-olds back then who loved Neon Indian and Washed Out who are now putting out their own records. […] How about the art-folk sound of the late ‘00s associated with Grizzly Bear, Bon Iver, and (kind of) Animal Collective? Again, it’s been over a decade since that stuff was really in vogue, so it’s ripe for rediscovery by a new generation (or a nostalgic revisiting by aging millennials).

~ Steven Hyden making a weapon of the truth in the latest indie mixtape, emphasis mine.

Swapped the stem on Lindsay’s bike. It seemed pretty straightforward, and thankfully it was every bit as easy as this video made it look. I skipped removing the front wheel since in my setup, the bikes sit on the ground while I’m working.

How To Change A Stem - Bicycle Mechanics

If you need a new ride and you’re close to Seattle, I’m selling my beloved Mini.

Apparently for years, Iain has thought that “Cake by the Ocean” was “King by the Ocean”. He was deeply in love with a song about a royal beach day.

Aubrey, this morning as I’m helping get her dressed: “Oh! Dad! I forgot about my bones!”

Genuinely surprised Machado is a Padre. I fully expected him in pinstripes. Relieved, and it’s good to see the Padres get better. Hopefully the fathers can teach him some humility.

Iain’s reading a book and described an “evil blowspout of bones” as if I needed any more evidence he’s my kid.

🤦🏽‍♂️

#mealprepsunday

Couldn’t we have let Hill wear his Dick Mountain jersey for the rest of his season? Seems like the right way to respect its greatness. ⚾️

I sank an hour before bed playing Donut County. If you were a fan of Katamari Damacy, this short iOS gem will be right up your alley.

Me, complaining that our toaster sometimes is a jerk: It’s 2018, it’s nearly 2019! It’s not hard to build electronics that compensate for a warm heating element and decrease the cook time accordingly
Lindsay: Oh my god, it’s a toaster let’s get mad about it.
Me: I mean, I listened to a podcast where toasters were reviewed…
Lindsay: 😶 Are you ok? Do you need friends?
Me: Well, I…
Lindsay: I mean, I know you’re a nerd but sometimes you really amaze me with how much of a nerd you really are.

I’ve been fighting with In-Air WiFi all day, and as frustrating as it is it’s also still incredible.

Russian Meddling Is a Symptom, Not the Disease

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have business models that thrive on the outrageous, the incendiary and the eye-catching, because such content generates “engagement” and captures our attention, which the platforms then sell to advertisers, paired with extensive data on users that allow advertisers (and propagandists) to “microtarget” us at an individual level.

The way social media incentivized divisive, eye-catching (and often factually incomplete if not entirely wrong) posts is a huge problem we don’t talk about or have any idea how to fix. And don’t look to Google and Facebook to fix this problem: to them, this problem is engagement, and makes their platforms more valuable.

I have two tickets available for Stuff You Missed in History Class Live in Seattle on the 13th. If you or someone you know wants ‘em, let me know.

via Gfycat

I animated FanGraphs’ projected playoff odds for the MLB each day of the season to commemorate the Mariners’ extraordinary failure.

I’m an Orioles and Mariners fan. This hurts. Actually, the next few seasons are probably going to hurt. ⚾️

@bradbarrish linked a playlist of 20 songs that “truly represent [his] muscial point-of-view”. I loved the idea. It’s a vague prompt, and I’m interpreting it as 20 songs that shaped my musical taste. I’ve ordered these in roughly chronological order of when I was introduced to the songs, not when they were released.

I’m also using this as an excuse to write up my memories of these songs, how I came to them, and what they meant to me. I wanted to pull this thread all the way through and add songs that are currently at the end of the threads these songs start, but the 20 song limitation wasn’t enough. That would be a fun follow-on.

tl;dr:

• Apple Music Playlist
• Spotify Playlist

1. Jim Croce - Operator

   My Dad’s musical taste was varied, but I think he only knew four or five artists’ names: Harry Belafonte, Randy Travis, Engelbert Humperdink, Neal Diamond, and Jim Croche. They all grated on me, except for Jim. Bad, Bad Leroy Brown, Time In a Bottle, I Got A Name. My favorite was the heartbreaking conversation Jim had with the operator when thinking of calling his ex. That’s still a resonant theme in music, some things don’t change. Simple guitar, a swelling refrain, and long car rides with my old man.

2. Beach Boys - Sloop John B.

   Mom gave me a cassette of the Beach Boys’ greatest hits when I was 3 or 4. I listened to it so much, I stretched the tape. I begged for a replacement, and stretched that one. Had to wait for a birthday to get another replacement. Sloop John B. and Wouldn’t It Be Nice were my favorites, but if I have to pick one, it’s an easy decision.

3. Beatles - Eleanor Rigby

   Concept Beatles are the best Beatles, and the grimy English city life that Eleanor Rigby evoked just really did it for me. The feeling of indvidualsliving in shared lonlieness is so well captured, and the string backing is perfect.

4. Billy Joel - Downeaster “Alexa”

   Storm Front was one of the first albums I asked my parents to buy me, after hearing the single We Didn’t Start the Fire. Downeaster Alexa was hurt.

5. Heart - Barracuda

   I don’t have a specific memory of Barracuda, but I knew all the words as a kid, and it’s directly applicable to my love of Garbage, Amanda Palmer, Tori Amos, Pretty Girls Make Graves, etc. etc.

6. Amy Irving and Charles Fleischer - Why Don’t You Do Right?

   Like so many boys of my generation, I found Jessica Rabbit…eye opening. She turned me on to a lot of things, and one of them was smoky, sultry jazz singers.

7. Pink Floyd - Is Anybody Out There

   I heard this song entirely out of context sitting on the floor of the living room of my childhood home, idly listening to my dad’s massive box of mixtapes and tapes of songs he’d recorded from the radio (remember how satisfying it was to get a perfect recording where you started the tape at just the right moment and the DJ didn’t interrupt with some asinine commentary), and Syd Barrett’s asking for acknowledgement resonated so strongly in me. I had no idea who it was - Dad didn’t know - but six or eight years later I heard The Wall, and everything made sense.

8. Ramones - I Wanna Be Sedated

   Energetic beats paird with lyrics of not wanting to feel this constant energy hit close to home. That’s being a teenager.

9. David Bowie - Rock ‘n’ Roll Suicide

   ”Oh! No, love, you’re not alone!” Chills. Every time.

10. The Doors - The End

    There aren’t words for The End, so I won’t force them.

11. Del the Funky Homosapien - If You Must

    Turned on by the Tony Hawk Pro Skater soundtrack, I couldn’t get enough of Del. When I heard Deltron 3030, it floored me. Hip Hop could be crerebral and funny and fun. It seems obvious now, but this was eye opening. (Pretty sure I remember it being “Del the Funkee Homosapien” and “If Ya Must” on the game, though)

12. Tori Amos - Datura

    A friend at summer camp let me borrow Under the Pink overnight, and I listened to it in my bunk. I liked it, but she liked it more than I did, and that fact limited how close our friendship could be. To Venus and Back, on the other hand, grabbed me immediately and hasn’t let go. It’s been nearly 20 years.

13. The Cure - Just Like Heaven

14. Depeche Mode - Enjoy the Silence

15. Nine Inch Nails - Sanctified

16. New Order - Age of Consent

    These four, together, capture my teenage industrial/new-wave romanticism. Age of Consent captured the feeling of seeing the fist light after partying all night in some black basement while listening to the other three. Which was pretty much how I spent my late teens and early 20s.

17. Bjork - Human Behavior

    Oh man, Human Behavior opened my eyes. Before this, my only exposure to Bjork was It’s Oh So Quiet, which is great but made me think she was a “Happy music” person. Obviously, I wasn’t paying attention.

18. Pixies - Wave of Mutilation

    I was tunred onto Pixies late, Doolittle came out in ‘89, and I didn’t listen to it until I was in high school, probably a decade later. Didn’t matter. Doolittle is timeless.

19. Tool - Parabol/Parabola

    This is a bit of a cheat, but the crescendo between the two tracks makes it. This specific transition led me into Godspeed! You Black Emperor and Mogwai. Between classes in college, I walked into one of Baltimore’s great local record shops (Record and Tape Traders, which was apparently and dissapointingly bought by FYE) and asked the guy behind the counter if he could think of anything else that made me feel the way that transition did; like a wave crashing on me, like tension being released. He nailed it. Also, this isn’t on the playlists because Tool is regressivly keeping their music off streaming services. Hope they come around.

20. At The Drive-In - One-Armed Scissor

    In 1999, At the Drive-In was supposed to be the future of punk. Relationship of Command was excellent, but the band dissolved, and Cedric and Omar moved on to the also-phenomenal The Mars Volta.

Wallace Falls with a visiting friend and a 30# unstable pack #getoutside #dadface

I love Siri Shortcuts and I love iCloud Photos, but putting the two together is a dance of crashes to the desktop, failures without error, and disappointment.