Day: May 11, 2004

Have you ever seen the ad for Oreck vacuum cleaners? They sell you an upright carpet cleaner, and as a “bonus” you get a little hand-held job with a shoulder strap for “free,” and it’s so powerful, it can lift a bowling ball?

Well, we actually bought one of these a few years ago, and the upright is a great, light-weight, easy-to-maneuver vac with a lot of suction, and the little guy works OK, but honestly it’s as good as a space heater as it is as a vacuum.

And also, sure, it’ll pick up a bowling ball, but then what? Do you know how many bowling balls fit in that little bag? That’s right, none.

I am tempted, though, to take ours out to the local bowling alley on a lark, plug it in, and start lifting balls and see what happens.

I don’t care much for a few of the words that writers seem to take pride in using. Here are a few that I just won’t ever use:

Career as a verb, as in ‘The car was careering wildly through the streets of downtown Auburn.’ If I ever go careering about, it will mean that I’m looking really hard for a job.

Careening… see careering above. When I need to tip to the side, I’ll do so, thank you. I shan’t careen, as I might appear to some to be careering.

Next is ‘rebuff’: If I ever do this, I won’t be snubbing you, I’ll just be polishing something for the second time.

Redoubtable: Huh? Do I doubt this guy or not?

So I’m over on Google’s Zeitgeist page, and I’ll be darned if William Hung isn’t #4 on the Top 5 entertainment searches. This is the guy from American Idol who is famous because he can’t sing.

What is the matter with you people?

I don’t ever download any music off the Internet, legal or otherwise, because we already have about 500 albums and 300 CD’s that we don’t ever listen to. But I do listen to the radio when I’m in my car, and I really like this stupid song that’s a remake of the Gloria Gaynor classic I Will Survive, which I hated, but it’s a little faster and a little more hip-hop, and it’s got a new chorus that goes something like ‘This love has taken its toll on me. You said, “Good-bye,” too many times before,’ and I’ve heard it something like 5 or 6 times, and I’ll be darned if they’ll ever tell me who it’s by.

So here’s a big ol’ clue for the RIAA: Stop suing kids for downloading Eminem bootlegs and try to get the radio stations to tell me who the songs are by so I can go out and buy their records!

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While I’m doh!-ing, here’s one for the think tank at the Microsoft campus: It would be really cool if when I get an HTML formatted message in Outlook, the status line would show me the URL for a link in the message body the way IE does. Seems like an easy thing.

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By the way, here’s a recycled post with links to some songs that I’ve recorded over the years. I have around 10 times the number of vistors I had when I originally posted this, so maybe someone will find something to enjoy, and please remember, bloggers live for comments.

I Don’t Love You No More	A lighthearted country ditty.
Why Are We All So Afraid?	Really cool guitar – good lyrics & good atmosphere provided by my brother Kevin.
All I Ever Wanna Do	Good song – the girl I wrote it for was unimpressed, but that’s OK – I like it. Not a very good recording, though.
Couples & Money	Very nice, bouncy little Beatlesque thing. Actually appears on a commercial audiobook by the same name, in a slightly different studio recording that’s not as good.
Go with the Flow	Major Lennon-ish production number.
For Chaaya	Very real sounding classical guitar piece, but it ain’t live – it’s Memorex. Even when I actually played this many years ago, I used several tracks.
Sometimes It’s Hard	This may well be the best thing I’ve ever come up with.
Levi’s 501 Ad	This was back in the days when Sasson jeans was running an ad where Elton John sang ‘Sassons mean so much.’ I actually sent it to Levi’s via Foote, Cone & Belding, and they sent it back registered mail with a copy of their unsolicited ideas policy.
Look Around	Another Lennon song I tried to write.
No Woman Blues	What it says.
Out in the Rain	This is my first big piano number from when we got my mother-in-law’s old piano a few years ago.
Separation	20-something angst about a long-distance romance. Nice pseudo-classical acoustic solo piece played live.
I’m So in Love with You	This may be my most elaborate production number to date.
Ton of Pain	Another light-hearted country piece.