true test

I forgot to pack my laptop for my nine-day trip back to Buffalo. Amanda tells me to disengage more from work. This will definitley make that happen. At least I can charge my iPod via my phone charger. I was hoping to blog more but without my laptop, I don't know whether that will happen. Hmmmmmmmmm.

Preview of review of Swell Season last night

I have to thank the amazing person who filmed this performance from what is one of the best shows of a year which has featured AMAZING shows.

You and me baby ain't nothin' but mammals ...

... so let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel. That's a 1.5-entrende from a song by the Bloodhound Gang. But it serves as a great intro to this post, which coming the day after the previous one marks the return of regular blogging.

This story in the Telegraph (UK) about how scientists recently discovered the fruit bats practice fellatio (oral sex) caught my eye for obvious and non-obvious reasons. Obvious, because as a guy I'm still basically an immature junior-high boy who giggles when news articles cover sex, particularly non-missionary sex.

But in the non-obvious (and far more important way) is because of one quote in the article from a scientist.

Frans de Waal, a primatologist at Emory University in Atlanta, said that animal oral sex may be more common than we realise, but researchers’ prudery has prevented this fact becoming known. He said: "Part of the reason fellatio is rarely mentioned is shyness about this issue."

De Waal is an expert on the bonobo chimpanzee, which prior to this finding about fruit bats, technically in this case the short-nosed fruit bats (Cynopterus sphinx), were thought to be the only animals besides humans to practice oral sex.

His quote stood out to me because it shows how our paradoxical prudishness about sex and sexuality is so detrimental to the advancement of knowledge. I get that studying the sexual behaviors of animals probably won't cure cancer or cure world hunger. But genetically we have so much in common with other primates, chimps in particular, but also animals, period (why do you think animals are tested on for cosmetics, medicines, etc.?), that to pretend it's unworthy of study is narrow-minded.

The researchers were good scientists and didn't make conclusive proclamations, but they speculated that it's possible the bats simply enjoyed it or that perhaps it was a way for females to hang onto mates longer. Either could be true. But the conclusion I'm willing to draw is that if it's OK for animals and OK to be written about with animals, it ought ot be OK for people to talk about, too, and for newspapers to write about with some delicacy, maturity and also even a little humor.

I was talking earlier tonight to a friend about my job as an editor at a teen newspaper and was guesstimating that as much as 3 percent of my job is to if not, teach, at least evangelize the potentially life-saving benefits of comprehensive sex education. I'm always aghast when we have discussions at staff meetings about sex education in schools how many students tell us that their teachers, and in many cases parents, haven't told them anything.

Back before Dennis Miller became a stool pigeon of the Republican Party he used to be a biting social commentator who had the stones to say that Clinton-era Surgeon General Joycleyn Elders deserved to be president for saying that masturbation should be taught in schools. In context what she was arguing for was comprehensive sex education that included factual information about masturbation—it's natural, normal, common, 100 percent safe if practiced correclty and something no one should be ashamed of.

But sadly, we live in a country with so many sexual hang-ups that a story about bat blow jobs made me laugh as a first reaction. Of course, saying "bat blow jobs" out loud is giggly. Perhaps the Bloodhound Gang will be inspired to write a single to their song, "The Bad Touch."

It is the romance of the heavens that awakens the blogger

This amazing story in the Science Times about using the solar wind to traverse interplanetary space caught my fancy today.

From the article (as is the Rick Sternbach computer image of the sail) by Dennis Overbye:

About a year from now, if all goes well, a box about the size of a loaf of bread will pop out of a rocket some 500 miles above the Earth. There in the vacuum it will unfurl four triangular sails as shiny as moonlight and only barely more substantial. Then it will slowly rise on a sunbeam and move across the stars.

LightSail-1, as it is dubbed, will not make it to Neverland. At best the device will sail a few hours and gain a few miles in altitude. But those hours will mark a milestone for a dream that is almost as old as the rocket age itself, and as romantic: to navigate the cosmos on winds of starlight the way sailors for thousands of years have navigated the ocean on the winds of the Earth.

Save for newspapers, particularly the NYTimes, which commits a whole day to a science section, where else could our general population read a story like this and get exposed to not just the technological advances of science, but perhaps more importantly the romantic notions of exploration that have fueled the scientist for millennia?

Though I am a word person by education and profession, I've always harboured a deep love for science and in adulthood even mathematics, which throughout my educational career I professed to detest. It was ironic because my aptitude scores in math were always in the mid90s percentile compared to 80s for verbal. I don't see them as exclusive at all, for the best reporters are just another form of scientist. A person in search for evidence of why things happen and who is always prepared to adapt a hypothesis in the face of countrary evidence and who is most content to allow others to reach the conclusions.

Sadly, mathematics and science seem not to be taught this way in school. Math is manipluation of numbers while science is the recitation of equations, principles named after dead men and memorization of obscure multi-syllabic words.

The student I actually tutored in math many years ago was literally amazed when I told her that math is NOT numbers. It is a way of thinking about the universe in terms of a search for certainty. It's a method that will allow you double check your work every time and approach any new situation with the ability to see it clearly through learning some mastery of logic. Sadly, she just thought math was numbers and she hated numbers.

I hope that people read this article about the solar sail and perhaps have their own version of Einstein's dream of traveling on a beam of light. And I hope that people remember WHERE they read it, as well. For if newspapers cease to exist who shall teach us of our world?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And speaking of great journalism, listen to this public radio piece about why parents need to talk to their children about money management done by one of the L.A. Youth alums.

Pre-34 blog post

I'm feeling old. I'm on deadline at work. I'm constantly tired. I am, of course, blogging about this at 12:36 a.m. That's one reason I'm blogging less often. But also, after the perfect song mix project, I honestly haven't been as motivated to blog lately. I don't want to be rest-on-my-affirmational-cliches guy, but I couldn't have been happier with how it went and the reactions from everyone that I haven't felt like I had much to say after that.

I've never blogged about my trip to SF; I suck. I shall. I shall, dammit.

But in the meantime, read L.A. Youth. One of our writers, Patricia, just wrote an amazing story about how she almost washed out of school after a combo of laziness, bad teaching, ditching and illness sabotaged her math future and then kept her out of school for much of two years, but ultimately thanks to her getting placed at an alternative high school she salvaged her academic career and her future.

It's one of the stories that I'm most proud of in all my time at L.A. Youth. With this one story she single-handedly blasted stereotypes about Compton, students who attend continuation schools and Latinas. Go, Patricia!

Seriously, Jon Stewart for some cabinet position, like secretary of common sense

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
CNN Leaves It There
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview

Best. Email. Ever.

I got this email this morning from my friend and former Albany Times Union co-worker Claire, who was one of the contributors to the Perfect Song Project.

Tess: “We want music.”

I pop in the Tom Chapin CD of kids’ songs.

Luke: “No, not THAT music. One of the cool CDs your friend Mike made you.”

(This is a very, very good sign. Turns out Lukien REALLY likes the Stones, The Who, and Bob Marley. I can live with that.)

-------------------------------------------

Other music notes. I feel sorry for one of our newer L.A. Youth writers who is writing about how she discovered the life-changing properties of rock-n-roll. This is in some ways, the story of my life particularly since moving to L.A., where I've become a concertmonster. I hope that I'll always remember to respect the vision she has for her story.

Finally, saw Thom Yorke at The Orpheum Sunday night. Wow. He played with Flea (amazing fucking bassist), Joey Waronker (REM drummer since Bill Berry retired), Mauro Refosco (supplementary percussionist) and Nigel Godrich (Radiohead producer extraordinaire).

I am not typically a dancer/mover at shows, preferring to lightly shake my body, bob my head and maybe tap my foot or my hand against my thigh. And even though Thom Yorke encouraged us to stand and dance and not to act like we were at the cinema, I was stiller at this show than almost any ever. But it wasn't because I wasn't moved, rather because I was mesmerized.

I've often not responded to electronica, which coincidentally enough can be called trance when composed in certain threads, because I find it boring and not in any way enrapturing. But when Yorke's The Eraser solo album was brought to live with such a talented band, I was simply stunned.

Flea's nearly virtuosic basswork added a vigorous pulse to every song, almost like a rumbling tremor cleavinng a beautiful glacier to reveal something hidden and dangerously interesting. And I can only pray that Waronker's freedom to bang the skins is carried onto the next REM album. Those combined with Refosco's percussive textures had virtually the entire rest of the nearly sold-out Orpheum dancing as much as is possible in the incredibly tight confines of the rows of an early 20th century (when people were much shorter) theater.

Add Godrich's synth/laptop/guitar and Yorke's delicately powerful vocals and it was the most visually musical experience I've probably ever had. In this case, I'm not referring to Yorke's rubberbandish dancing or Flea's non-stop gyrating, but like I felt like I could see the sounds and the best metaphor I can come up with is that it was a 3D fullspectrum rainbow.

My favourite song was Super Collider, which is a Radiohead that debuted during last year's tour. He played that haunting piano ballad immediately after Open the Floodgates, which also blew me away.

http://pitchfork.com/news/36693-report-thom-yorke-in-los-angeles/

Why Apple people are proud to be anti-Microsoft snobs

I love this video. With the in-your-face age, racial and gender diversity, too-well-rehearsed "uhs" and "likes," desperately random (Clarice) pans and zooms, painfully faux-extemporaneous "oh and ..." afterthoughts, creepy fourth-wall violating do-I-look-at-the-camera-now-confusion, JC Penney wardrobe in the Home Depot Kitchen, and enough fake laughing to fill an NFL pre-game studio show if it was composed of every networks' crew, Microsoft's "how to host your own Windows 7 launch party" video takes the concept of unintentional comedy to quanta that I didn't know existed. It's like discovering a singularity-dense collection of dark matter that is the source of all other unintentional comedy. The best thing, though, is who the fuck host's an at-home launch party for a fucking computer operating system? I'll tell you who doesn't ... Apple devotees.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wish I could fathom why I haven't blogged so much in the past two months. Mostly work-related exhaustion. Sadly, the older I get the more the five-month sprint from July-November takes out of me and the earlier in the race that I start really feeling the drain. Because I have had things that I want(ed) to blog about ... like my amazing first trip to San Francisco (amazing everything, especially food and friends) town; a woman in Africa who continues to wear pants despite that being against the law; the opening of a new university in Saudi Arabia that has me genuinely excited to about continuing my education in a different part of the world; the joy of being surprised at a rock show (by Phoenix); discovering a former student's excellent blog about her experiences living and studying in India. I hope that by typing those post ideas down I shall force myself to write them, particularly since a couple are related to emails I've promised to send. I'm the let-downer friend. Argh, I never wanted to be that guy.

Democracy in trouble alert -- seriously

Here's an amazing and frightening New York Times story about how news organizations (primarily newspapers traditionally) are cutting back on their spending to fund cases to keep courts open to the public.

Some highlights:

• The American Civil Liberties Union and other civil rights groups have taken the leading role in trying to shake loose information about the Bush administration’s policies and actions.

• As part of the settlement in a case involving Amtrak, the parties asked Judge Lawrence F. Stengel of Federal District Court in Philadelphia to “direct LexisNexis and Westlaw to remove the decisions” from “their respective legal research services/databases.”

The judge agreed, and the database companies complied.

Westlaw spokesman John Shaughnessy, which is owned by ThomsonReuters, said that the record's case number will exist and a note indicating that the judge ordered the record deleted will remain. WTF??? Noting the existence of censorship is still censorship.

We don't do everything better in America ... not even country music in this case

Newest music recommendation: Baskery. A trio of Swedish sisters who play some mean country with just a tinge of occassional punkishness to bring something new to their sound.

I saw them a few weeks ago (and suck for not blogging about it until today) at a tiny show at The Hotel Cafe. There were literally about 18 of us watching the show, which was a motherfuckingshame because these women were incendiary when they were playing the fast stuff and slash the heartstrings when going more traditional countrystyle.

They caught my eye about two months ago when I was trolling the HC's events calendar. I hadn't been in a looooooong time and missed it, especially the world's greatest chicken quesadilla. While scanning the calendar grid, a picture of three very attractive women caught my eye. I clicked on the word Baskery and was taken to the band's myspace. The banjo, guitars and harmonies blew me away, along with the stylistic description of "Alternatve / Punk / Country."

And I can say that after watching them, their myspace doesn't do them justice. Live is a much more vigorous and urgent experience. The song "One Horse Down" is a great rip-roarer online, but online it was the fire-breathing dragon of the set with fierce yowls, scorching guitar and dangerously infectious energy. And the deliciously emasculating "Out-of-towner" (which features basically one lyric "I don't wanna go to bed with a man from town"), which they dedicated to the boys in Stockholm basically had all the guys there ready to prove their non-Swedish lineage. What else can one ask for in a show, right?

Discovering Baskery's existence and then being able to see them for all of $12.50 (we were the only people to buy our tix ahead of time), is what makes living in L.A. sofuckingbeautiful. So if you wanna seem infinitely ahead of the musical curve in your non-L.A. part of the world drop Baskery as a band to watch 2010 and you'll be hot shit. And in 2012 you'll be really cool for liking such a talented obscure band of Swedish sisters.

If you're still not convinced, read the reviews included on the embedded image!