Veronica Mars

Ah.... Netflix is good to me. Television reviews of Everwood, Gilmore Girls and Arrested Development, and the much missed, cut-down-in-its-prime Wonderfalls have led me to yet another underrated, underappreciated television series, Veronica Mars. Now that I live somewhere where I can get UPN, I'm trying to catch up with season 1 on DVD, via Netflix. I've watched the first four episodes, and I'm liking what I'm seeing so far.

Snow is here!

It's snowing, it's snowing.... But I don't hate the weather. I've even walked to the drug store, grocery store, bank, and our real estate agent in it. I'm beginning to think I could go completely carless. My poor car has 106,000 miles on it from all the abuse it's taken over the past few years - even though I was carpooling the last six months of that. Now, I've gone over a month on one tank of gas. What a change!

CBC Radio 3 Podcast

Okay - I am officially addicted to the CBC Radio 3 podcast, now that I've moved far enough away from Ontario shores to actually pull in Canadian media over the airwaves. This is actually better - all Canadian indie music, rather than the mainstream media. (The mainstream media over there is neat though - it's like America looking at itself through a distorted looking glass that makes you look thinner and more attractive and have a charming accent.)

I've been listening to a lot of the following bands that I found on the CBC podcast:

The Weakerthans
Falconhawk
The New Pornographers
Lo and the Magnetics

I caught up with a bunch of the past broadcasts on a day to myself over Labor Day weekend while Tiffany was out of town - while I was listening, a couple of songs came on in a row that my friend Erin had tried to introduce me to - I actually recognized them, they hooked me into listening to more, and now I listen all the time. (Canada, technology, good music, and a neat coincidence - what could be better for me?)

Common Census

This site is a neat place for the ultimate map nerd I am.... The common census is trying to draw an approximation of the map of the United States, based on what people enter in as their local and regional city hub. When data is collected, it's plotted out on a map that's growing more and more detailed as more and more people contribute their data. It's also doing it by sports teams to see where folks affinities lie. It's very interesting, if very imperfect at this point. A quick couple minute survey of where you live and where you think you live will help move their site along. (All free, no obligation or anything...)

Love this time of year

November starts out gorgeous and ends with snow. Today is one of those brittle fall days when your eyes slice through the sunshine and the air looks as invisible as you think in your mind it should be, if you actually stop to think about it.

I'm still taking in this new Depeche Mode CD, which sounds better and better every time I listen to it. I'm particularly enamored now with tracks seven and eight, "I Want It All" and "Nothings Impossible". Depeche Mode has always pulled off this darkly confident, proudly depressed state of mind - a mood you have to share to want to listen to I think, but it's perfect for me right now. I was listening to a lot of Moby's opening track on Hotel, "Raining Again" which is an incredibly depressing song with a very catchy beat. "Nothings Impossible" is the opposite, it's pretty uplifting but it plods along like a funeral dirge. It has a lot of synth in it too that really works without sounding gimmicky at all.

In case you don't often check back through previous postings, I wanted to mention that Lo and the Magnetics posted their translation of "Tachee" in English here. I thought it was neat because my idea of what the song was about was pretty close, even though I only understood very small bits and pieces of the original French. It was very nice of them to post!!!