The Big 4

I'm still at a loss to explain what it is about Indio which drew Slayer, Megadeth, Metallica and Anthrax to the Empire Polo Club to perform. Not that there's anything wrong with Indio, but there's a reason that so few people go there. There's not exactly a list of things that you could point to that would put it on the map.

Not that the Empire Polo Club doesn't do its best to try. The place is huge, which I really didn't appreciate when I was driving down there. I've been to Indio a handful of times before and had visited a few local places but none of them the Polo Club. I think that I've been missing out. The facility is gigantic, much larger than any other concert event I've gone to before. I think the largest theater I've seen a show at was in Phoenix at the Sun Devil stadium, but this place could probably fit two "Sun Devils" back to back. It's perfect for a concert, especially one that drew the crowd that the Big 4 did.

I don't think I've ever seen so many tattered black t-shirts gathered together in once place before. It was really something to see.

Now this concert was taking place on 04-23, but that didn't mean that 04-20 wasn't still in full swing in the parking lot. The moment your car comes to a stop on the hard packed grass field, a wave of metallic smoke assaults you from all sides. The cloud hovered over the concert for most of the afternoon and didn't fully dissipate until about 10 miles out of town. If 7-11's ran out of Slurpee's in the greater Indio area for the next few weeks, I think I know the reason.

The only drawback to the concert was the sun which beat down all day. The concert gates opened at 2:00pm, which meant that I was broiling under the Southern California sun for hours before it finally went behind the mountains and gave the crowd some relief. I'm crispy today, but very happy. If there's one thing that is guaranteed to get the blood flowing it's listening to Metallica and Megadeth very, very loudly!

I Am A Pirate King!

I just got accepted to be part of a production for The Pirates of Penzance! And I get to be the Pirate King!

For the majority of the performances, I'll be part of the crew. But as a cool little side line I'll be the understudy for the Pirate King. The way this production company works is that the understudies get 2 performances even if the 'main' is there. I thought about it and determined that's a sneaky way to make sure that the understudies have lots of incentive to learn the parts they would be subbing for. So while I will be part of the crew for the run, there are two performances where I get to be the captain of the dread ship Tarantula! HA!

When I was trying out for the performance I thought that I'd take any part with the exception of the Major General, because he has the famous song that's a tongue-twister. I'm sure you know it, even if you don't know that it's a staple of PoP. It's the song that goes, "I am the very model of a modern major general, I've information animal and vegetable and mineral. I know the kings of England and I quote the facts historical, from Aaragon to Waterloo in order categorical." Woah.

It wasn't until after I'd accepted the understudy role that I remembered the Pirate King has a wonderful little tongue-twister song of his own which he belts out at a clip that leaves the orchestra panting for breath afterward. Humm. In the words of the Penzance constabulary, "Oh well, too late now!"

One Website at a Time

One of the fun things about a class on website design and development is that at the end of the class you have a fully working and functioning website. It's like those A+ classes people take to learn how to repair computers. When the class is over, in addition to a ink-jet certificate of completion you get a brand new computer to haul away. Talk about a bonus! It makes sitting through lectures worthwhile.

The class that I'm taking now has lots of helpful and interesting concepts as to what makes a 'good' website, but the real attraction to me is that I get to work on a website that will be mine at the end of the class. I'm thinking that for this one I'm going to put together an online file sharing platform for music and graphics which can be hosted anywhere very easily. The graphics I'll make as the class goes along. Right now I'm just putting in placeholder content so I have a framework to develop the design around. Graphics are a kick, but they're a pain to do when you've got deadlines looming over your head.

As a side not and not pertaining to anything, Conan stories are much more entertaining to read than I'd given them credit for. I'd known about Robert Howard for years, and appreciated his other writings but had imagined that the Conan stories wouldn't have too much depth to them. They don't really, but they ooze atmosphere and you can't help but sit up a little straighter in your chair as you read about the barbarian lopping people's heads off just because they invade the Aquilonian kingdom. Yes, I'd probably be tempted to do the same thing myself if I were in his shoes, but I'd lack the finesse he displays on each page.

Does anyone know how many times the word "thews" appears in a typical Conan story? I'm thinking it's about 50.

The Right Type

As a not so great man (Mr. Rumsfield) once said, there are things that we know and things that we don't know and then things that we know we don't know and things that we don't know we don't know. Known unknowns and unknown unknowns. Yes, a font of wisdom was he.

I just found out that there are lyrics to Stars and Stripes Forever, and not the "Be kind to your fine feathered friends..." Actually lyrics by Sousa himself. Um, they are something all right. Some knowledge I wish I could unknow after I know it.

Salon Comes Through

Every now and then, Salon posts an article that is worth reading. To wit:

"There are several points worth highlighting about all of this. First, it demonstrates how many people purport to believe in free speech but don't. The whole point of the First Amendment is that one is free to express the most marginalized, repellent, provocative and offensive ideas. Those are the views that are always targeted for suppression. Mainstream orthodoxies, harmless ideas, and inoffensive platitudes require no protection as they are not, by definition, vulnerable to censorship. But as has been repeatedly seen in history, ideas that are despised and marginalized are often proven right, while ideas that enjoy the status of orthodoxy prove to be deeply erroneous or even evil. That's why no rational person trusts the state -- or even themselves -- to create lists of Prohibited Ideas. And those who endorse the notion that ideas they hate should be forcibly suppressed inevitably -- and deservedly -- will have their own ideas eventually targeted by the same repressive instruments."

The rest can be found here.

Twitter High-Card

As a quick note to anyone who might be reading this in the future, Twitter was something that we did way back in the past to send messages to each other composed of a few score letter entire. It was sort of like a mini-telegraph. Yeah, we were a simple people back then.

But Twitter High-Card. This is a game that I've invented and found it actually makes use of the primary function and purpose of Twitter: marketing. Specifically, taking something innocuous and twisting into a cynical marketing ploy with all the grace and elegance of an oil-covered buzzard trying to steal your wallet.

Remember "High Card"? It's the simpliest game in the world. What you do is draw a card, and hope that it is higher than the card the person you're playing with draws. That's it. If you have the highest card, you win.

OK, now to add the Twitter element. Twitter is used to poach potential consumer-sheep who naively think that Twitter is something which elevates mankind somehow. Whenever you 'tweet' a keyword suggesting you are shopping for something, you start getting 'followed' by marketers on Twitter. Just like you get followed by thugs when you withdraw large sums of money from the ATM.

(For people in the future, "money" was something we had at one time when we had "jobs" that "made things")

So the game is played much the same way as you would with the deck of cards. Only in this case, you put out a tweet, and the person who gathers the most marketing-bot followers wins the game. The strategy is tweeting as many keywords as you can in the Twitter character limit.

For example, you could tweet something like:

"insurance credit cell phone iPod Chevy Pepsi Mastercard"

Actually, if you did that your computer might melt under the torrent of automated marketing hits that you'll generate. Humm. Maybe this game should come with a warning label.

A Time To Laugh, A Time To Love

A time to think deep thoughts over a steaming mug of hot coffee and ponder the great questions of the Universe. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about.

One of the greatest things about America is April Fool's Day. I can't get over it. There must have been a point in our collective history where the leaders of our peculiar nation got together and recognized a need to have a holiday that was double-dipped in awesome sauce and deep fried in amazing. There's nothing better. April Fool's is where it's at.

Please note the use of the possessive apostrophe at the end of "Fool" to designate very clearly that the day belongs to April Fools (that is, the plural of fool). So the day is the sole terratory and possession of those who which to walk on the wild side and exercise there right to lay claim to the greatest holiday we've got. I'm one of them, and I have no problem saying that. Yeah, if there's a potential for fun then count me in!