Friday Random Ten: The Commute from Hell Edition

Fire up the iPod, set it to shuffle, and write down the first ten songs that play. No cheating. No skipping forward.

1. Mary—Tori Amos
2. Love Affair—Kylie Minogue
3. Shallow Then Halo—Cocteau Twins
4. I Float Alone—Julee Cruise
5. Nathan Jones—Bananarama
6. Good Enough—Sarah McLachlan
7. Cherry Lips—Garbage
8. Des heures hindoues—Étienne Daho
9. Boat Drinks—Jimmy Buffett
10. For the Love of Ivy—The Mamas and the Papas

And there you have it. I'm in one of those all-too-common moods that makes me wish I were an island, alone and in solitude. It's about noon now, and I'm wishing for 4:30 p.m., although I know that my commute home isn't going to be any more fun than the morning was. I am ride-sharing again, and I have nothing constructive to say, and an hour in silence with someone who wants to talk is too uncomfortable even for me.

The Friday Random Ten: The Only Reason This Blogs Exists Edition

Fire up the iPod, set it to shuffle, and write down the first ten songs that play. No cheating. No skipping forward.

1. Right Now—Mary Chapin Carpenter
2. Body to Body, Heart to Heart—Cher
3. Quand je t'oublie—Patricia Kaas
4. You Should Hear How She Talks About You—Melissa Manchester
5. Ain't No Way to Treat a Lady—Helen Reddy
6. Why'd You Come in Here Looking Like That—Dolly Parton
7. No Questions Asked—Fleetwood Mac
8. On a Clear Day, You Can See Forever—Barbra Streisand
9. Ain't No Particular Way—Shania Twain
10. Higher and Higher—Moody Blues

I've got one week before I get to take a week off and get the fuck out of Dodge. I'm counting the minutes until Saturday afternoon.

Friday Random Ten: The Why-the-Hell-Not Edition

Fire up the iPod, set it to shuffle, and write down the first ten songs that play. No cheating. No skipping forward.

1. Tout décidé—Laurence Jalbert
2. You Are Woman, I Am Man—Barbra and Omar
3. Celui que j'aime—Mireille Mathieu
4. Pourtant—Roch Voisine
5. Walking on Broken Glass—Annie Lennox
6. Free Love—Voice Farm
7. Wash Me Clean—kd lang
8. Kiss Them for Me—Siouxsie and the Banshees
9. Ton premier regard—Garou
10. The Best Thing for You—Diana Krall

Today is my last day at work. No I didn't quit or get the sack. I'm taking a vacation! Wow. Big day. I never take vacations, even after I accrue 200 hours of vacation time and they warn me with disciplinary action because I need to give myself a break do I take a vacation. I never call in sick, either, unless, well, that's different.

So, tomorrow I'm packing up the car and driving into the desert for the week. I have no idea what to expect, although my expectations are high...does that make sense? I should be back the following Saturday, just in time to enjoy a three-day holiday weekend. It will also be the last big vacation that I take this year, unless I can convince the new management that I will need a break in late summer/early autumn, in which case I'll take my hard-earned and -saved money and go to England. Or Montréal. Or Budapest. Or a cruise somewhere...I don't know...wet.

I always feel odd when I leave home for too long. I know it's a good thing, and that we should all try to take time off and relax, but it's so foreign to me. I never had the money, I never had paid time off, and now that I have some money and lots of paid time off, it really should be used. Duh, like I'm so preaching to the choir. The trouble is, for me anyway, that living in California, it's so far away from anywhere I want to go, so saving the cash to take a long journey takes a long time. You can only see the state capitol so many times before you get bored, you know.

Well, I hope to come home with at least one story and a tan. I'm taking my passport in the trumped up hopes of running into intrigue and passion. I know I should delete that thought from this entry, but it's a hint at the state I'm in.

Bye.

Mutterings and Catch-up

1. Crowd[s] :: not a big fan of ’em.
2. Hamburger :: fries, and a Coke
3. Choker :: Hair, nails, makeup
4. Lights :: That's the night that the ... went out in Georgia.
5. Tinsel :: Town is overrated.
6. Testament :: Strictly Old Testament
7. Best part of the day :: when I'm lying down in bed, stretching out my legs, and quickly falling asleep. (That's like fifteen minutes from now.)
8. Election :: How can you not adore Reese Witherspoon?
9. Clarinet :: Played for eight years. (Bass Clarinet for three.)
10. Cake or death :: Is this "give me cake or give me death"? If so, cake, please.

So, I'm back in the Bay Area. I was in Palm Springs all of last week, hence no Friday Random Ten. I know, big loss. Big. Huge. Actually, I was driving home on Friday, but don't tell anyone else that. As far as they know, I just got home tonight. (Don't ask.)

I had a brilliant time down there. When I arrived on Sunday afternoon, the thermometer said, "115°F," (46°C) and I said, "WTF?" although a little more verbosely and I had to question why I had decided to take my only vacation in the desert. By Monday, it had dropped to a cooler, but still comfortable, 105°F (41-ish°C), comfortable because it's a dry heat, you know. (And I'm thinking about doing my birthday in Vegas. Whatever.) Didn't matter because I spent most of my time bouncing between the pool, the hot tub, and Room No. 3. (I was in Room No. 2) I met some more really great people, only burned my shoulders because I couldn't reach them to apply the amazing (but very alcoholic) Bull Frog QuickGel sunblock (36 SPF), and wished I didn't have to leave so soon. I didn't do a damn thing, I tell you. I brought four books, a dozen DVDs (of which I only watched one: Yossi & Jagger...so touching, so sweet, so hot!), and 117 podcasts that I had amassed but not listened to, and it was all kind of a waste. I really just hung out and relaxed. No work. No phone calls. No clocks. Nothing.

So, what happened on Saturday and Sunday? I'm sorry, I can't talk about that here. Maybe some other time. It was so bloody worth it, though. Uh huh!

And the best part is that I have one more day off before it's back to the grind and even that doesn't seem all that threatening anymore. And it was only 70°F (21°C) in Oakland today!

Too tired to keep my eyes open. Bye.

Lady Mix-a-Lot

Every once in a while I read an article that really stands out and hits me. (Well, that happens more than I'd like to admit, but if I did, it would look like I'm interested.) I saw this one on Salon this morning. It feels odd to think about mix tapes as being something to study or treat as a dying art.

When I found out how easy it was to make a cassette tape of my favorite music, that's all I wanted to do. My dad showed me how to record my 45s onto a tape, and I was in love. Over time, the 45s became other cassettes and then CDs. Now that I have my iPod, I wonder if I would ever make a mix tape again. I have dozens of them out in storage, just sitting in an old backpack, some without covers or labels. Half the fun in playing the unmarked tapes is finding out what's on them! I brought some of them back with me and they're here, I can see them now, and every so often I go through them for a listen or two.

I've always been impressed at how music has such a huge effect on me and my state of mind. If ever I'm in a bad mood or need to be cheered up, I'll look for the B-52s. If I need to feel nostalgic (which is bad in itself), I'll play some Bananarama or 10,000 Maniacs. I have mix tapes of all of them, but I also have my iPod now. Such a conflict. I can't think that I'll ever get rid of the tapes. I'll keep them until they break or until there's no more technology to support them. I have an old Walkman whose cover won't even stay closed anymore (I dropped it and snapped the plastic hinge). So I wrapped a super-sized rubber band around the thing to keep the tape in. This is what I use to listen to the tapes. I know it's ghetto, and almost a little sad, but I can't get rid of it.

Some of my favorite mix tapes were made by friends with whom I lost contact years ago. They're reminders of a relationship from a different time. Some of the tapes I have are copies of tapes I gave to people, copies I made for myself because I liked the mix so much I wanted one for me. One tape in particular, a nicely composed cassette liner and everything, was made for a dear, dear friend before I moved to the Bay Area. I never had a chance to give it to her (and who knows how to work the postal system, you know), and so I've kept it all this time as my reminder of her. Isn't that odd? But I think that is by far the best mix tape I have ever made, and I simply can't get rid of it. A few of the tapes I've made and been given I've even gone to the extent of duplicating on CD so I can listen in better quality or to preserve the song lists even longer.

And then there are the tapes that are irretrievably lost due to theft of vandalism. The first time my car was broken into, my old ’83 Rabbit, I had ten tapes, all mixes, stolen with the tape deck. I can understand the radio, but why the tapes? They have no monetary value whatsoever, and who wants to buy a mix tape on the street? Or worse, to think that the loser thief threw them all away when he realized that they weren't the latest New Order or Pearl Jam tapes.

I miss the tapes more than the radio. I'll never forget them, though I can't remember their lists. One of them, from Skot, was so eclectic, so unique to my ears, it was the best learning experience, the best awakening out of ’80s pop and into ’80s alternative/new wave/punk. I listened to that tape for hours over and over again, memorizing the words to "Daisy" by Danielle Dax and "How Soon Is Now?" by the Smiths way before it was the theme to one of my favorite TV shows. When Napster came along, I instantly went searching for some of these songs in order to reconnect to that feeling of new and different, even though by that time I had amassed my own collection of new and different, thanks to Skot and his tapes. Talk about a mix tape lover. He made them for every occasion, every road trip, every new artist he found. He would decorate the tapes and the liners with his own hand, his own unique handwriting. They were works of art, in my opinion, and they're the ones I miss the most.

Mix CDs just don't cut it like tapes do, and mix playlists on the iPod are I guess the new standard, but how do you give a playlist to someone without giving them the song files, too? I've thought a lot about this recently. I'm going to move soon, and when I do, I fully intend to leave Roommate a CD or some sort of compilation of songs by which he will always remember/never forget me. It's wholly unnecessary because after eleven years, I can't forget him no matter how hard I try and I'm guessing it's the same for him, but that's not the point. I intend the mix to be biting and sarcastic but touching and a bit melodramatic. How do I do that on the iPod without grabbing his and downloading the songs on to it? And then, how do I ensure that he will listen to the songs in the order I want without shuffling through them and breaking their connections to one another?

Change is good, and heaven knows I love technology and gadgets, but sometimes the old-fashioned way is the best way. Sure we sacrifice quality with mix tapes, but that's not what they're about anyway. I often made them to give a piece of me to someone else, to introduce them to a bit of my life and how I think. I miss that, and I miss having friends who like the idea of sharing music instead of SMS messages.