Escovedo Rocks The Highline

Alejandro Escovedo's show last night at the Highline Ballroom seemed to exist in some twilight zone between 1978 and 2008, swinging back and forth, diving into pure punk, soaring upward with achingly beautiful guitar and string arrangements, and then crashing back with squeals of guitar feedback. In the center of it all was Escovedo, spinning to face the crowd, the strings, the guitars or the drums, urging them on, feeding off their energy and spitting it back out. Well, no real spitting involved, but there were moments when Escovedo came close, abandoning his guitar for the Iggy Pop-inspired "Real As An Animal" so he could grip the mike stand with two hands and sway from side to side, appearing poised to dive into the crowd. But there was no stage diving or slam dancing, with a crowd that was somewhere between crushing the stage and sitting at the outer ring of tables, nodding in time to the music. And that was just fine for Escovedo as he took us on a whirlwind trip through the last thirty years, finishing up with the Stones "Beast of Burden" before walking slowly off stage as his amazing band played out the last few bars.

A nice collection of photos from the show is here, including one featuring yours truly. Another great set of photos is here

What am I missing?

So today the House of Representatives approved the revised FISA bill that includes a "compromise" to the telecom immunity. As usual, Glen Greenwald at Salon explains the issues brilliantly. If the government can initiate a wiretap immediately and has 72 hours to get a court approval after the fact then what is the problem? Historically, the FISA court has approved nearly all government requests. And if the telco companies broke the law by letting the administration bully them shouldn't they be held accountable? It boggles the mind that conservatives are not up in arms that the government can strongarm telco companies to spy on our communications. Since when are conservatives for more government oversight?

At this point it appears that FISA is a done deal. The only solution now is to direct your campaign contributions to candidates that opposed the FISA "compromise". The House vote is here and the Senate votes next week.

John McCain v2.0 Project

Open Left has started a project to get informative articles about John McCain ranked highly on Google searches. It's sort of a "Google Bomb" variation, intended to direct anyone searching for John McCain to a site with a reasoned criticism of one or more of John McCain's policies. The article about this John McCain project is cross-posted on DailyKos. OK, and did I mention that this is all about John McCain and getting John McCain links out there for readers to see? :)

My life as a movie mogul

You would think that owning and running a hardware store six days a week would take up all my time, and you'd mostly be right. However, since both my brother and my sister are involved in filmmaking I occasionally get a chance to dabble in the film business.

My first experience was as an extra in a movie being filmed on Long Island with a working title of "The Sound". It's written and directed by Roger Majowski and my daughter, my nephew, my sister and I all were extras in the film. Sadly, it's been a few years since the film was shot and it's still in limbo. There have been a couple of test screenings, but my guess is it won't see the light of day.

My more recent experience has been as an investor in a film called The Marconi Bros. My brother knew the writer/director team and they let me invest a small chuck of change in the film. It actually stars some excellent actors, including Jon Polito and Dan Fogler, and amazingly the film is actually done and will premiere at the South by Southwest Film Festival. I've seen a few cuts of the film over the last year and it really is quite good. Hopefully it will also get into the Tribeca Film Festival in NY next month, and then who knows.

Lolcat Bible Translation...lol!

I don't know if this project aiming to translate the Bible from English into Lolcat is sacreligious, but it sure is funny IMHO. Here's a sample:

Job 6:12

6 Teh ayngles wented to seez Ceiling Cat, and Saitin wented two.7 Ceiling Cat axt Saitin, "Wher wuz u?" Saitin saied "Oh, hai. I'z wuz in ur earth, wawking up and down uponz it."8 Teh Ceiling Cat sayd "Has u seen mai servnt Job? He can has cheezburger cuz he laiks me."

9 "No wai!" sed Saitin.10 "U just plyin favrits.11 If u take his cheezburgers, he no laiks u no moar."

12 Then teh Ceiling Cat sed "Okai, u can take his bukkit, but no hurtzing Job hissef." And then Saitin went awai.

The entire thing is Wiki based so you can help translate in your free time.

Garfield without so much Garfield

I've never been a fan of Garfield, but this cool site presents Garfield comic strips sans the annoying lasagna-loving feline. The strip takes on a whole new meaning when you leave off the furry critter.

John McCain

This video of John McCain is just too funny. Great to see how he straight talks his way around and around. I also like this video of McCain which is a parody of the Barack Obama "Yes We Can" music video. What political videos are you watching?

Why blog?

As a lifelong geek and a long time Internet user, it seems natural that I should put together a blog of some sort. Add the fact that I'm a liberal in a pretty conservative industry (hardware retailing) and it seems even more natural that I'd want to post my thoughts, ideas, activities, and other assorted ramblings online for others to read and comment on. So, this is a starting point for the blog. It might not go anywhere from here, or it might turn into something I update regularly. Stay tuned (or not).