Vampire Weekend

I’m not totally sure what it is, but Vampire Weekend really does it for me lately. Is it that Ivy-League-undergrads-appropriating-Afro-pop quality? Yes.

http://www.vampireweekend.com/

The Pool

One of the last days of summer. Open swim at the nearby high school. We actually got kicked out by the grumpy janitor for arriving after hours. He probably thought we were high school kids. Debbie only was able to get in up to her waist — it takes her about a half hour to get into a cold pool. I got in all the way (inspired by Bear Grills), despite my inability to swim.

Pandora Radio

I just played with the Pandora application on my iPhone and I am totally amazed. My mind is blown. Punch in almost any artist and music from that artist or similar artist will play. I’m probably late to the game on this one. Better late than never.

Regarding Henry

Debbie is due any day now. I am a mixed bag of emotions, but mostly I’m excited and amazed. It’s difficult to put it into words. With the exception of my wedding, I’ve never looked forward to anything more than this.

Hair

I’ve had too many bad haircuts in my life. The teenage years were particularly bad, as evidenced the 1984-1989 editions of the Brookfield Central High School Year Book. Years of frustration over bad hair led me to teach myself how to cut my own hair. Today, I’m pretty good it. I’ve read that George Hamilton and George Clooney cut their own hair — if this duo of Georges is not the epitome of masculinity… Cutting one’s own hair is not for the meek. One must have an acute perception of depth and good “in-mirror” hand eye-coordination. One must have the steadiness of a surgeon, or at least that of a good barber. One must also have a little luck.

You only have yourself to blame if there is a mistake. Mistakes can only be undone by cutting more, but of course, the hair is finite, and you can only make mistakes for so long. Try as you might, you cannot put the hair back. Errors of the coiffure can be punishingly embarrassing for days, nay weeks. But at the approaching-middle-age stage of life I find myself, I have many years of experience under my belt, and I have learned from past errors in judgement.

So I cut with great confidence and self-assuredness. I go to great lengths to ensure quality, to get it the way I like it, to the way I know it looks best. 20 minutes later, when the last cut is made and the hair is on the floor like so much fallen snow (albeit, spikey, black snow) there is deep satisfaction in knowing that the job has been done right. And I ask myself rhetorically, “Can my hair get more bangin’ ?”

Now styling, or “training your hair” as my dad used to say, that’s another story.

Anagrams

http://www.wordsmith.org/anagram/

“Anagrams never lie.”

Some choice anagrams of my name:

Apogee Gorgon
Engage Goo Pro
Grape Gone Goo
Reggae Goon Op
Oregano Egg Op
Anger Ego Goop

Goodbye to Ducati Monster

Looking good.

A few weeks ago I sold one of my bikes, the 2001 Ducati Monster Dark, to my friend, Miguel. It was a little sad to see it go, but I needed the room in the garage. Before I would let him buy it, I told him we had to do the mods I had planned for the bike years ago. So we chopped the rear tail, or beer-shelf as it’s affectionately called by American Ducatisti, relocated the license plate, and changed out the turn signals. It was fun to work on the bike. A rare manly endeavor. I even did some fabrication, fashioning nice license plate brackets out of the old plate holder. The bike turned out great — it looks the way it was meant to look. Of course, as with a lot of these home customization jobs, there are some niggling problems to work out. The new turnsignals keep shorting. Not sure what the problem is.