My search for a local crepe complet continues.

You may recall my slightly discouraging encounter with the local establishment, Boba Crepe, where things seemed a bit too Asian-influenced for a creperie. Naturally, that unsatisfying adventure only increased my cravings for some real crepes. I checked online and found a place that promised something a little more authentic (it's so cute, they put the menu in French--'cause that's a certain sign of quality and authenticity!).

So I went to this tiny place in the fancy boutique district to have an overpriced crepe ($13 for ham & cheese, drink, and tip). I seem to recall that I paid 7 Euros for a crepe complet, dessert crepe and a drink in Eaux Bonnes, France (and there's no tipping over there), but it's just fast food over there! It was tasty at this place and the waiter was pleasant and solicitous.

I might go back, but they still don't know how to make the crepe complet!

CDs listened to today:

• Pink: Missundaztood
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 9
• Steve Reich: Four Organs
• Frank Sinatra: The Capitol Years, disk 1
• Bill Frisell Quartet: (eponymous)
• Alexander Scriabin: The Symphonies, disk 2
• Kevin Puts: Dark Vigil
  

Rupert Murdoch really ticks me off.

You may not have heard of him, but you know a lot about him. He's the head of a company called News Corporation, which he and his family control. Mr. Murdoch is a naturalized American citizen, born in Australia, and the king of a huge media empire. Among other things, News Corp. owns DirecTV, The Wall Street Journal, the Fox TV networks, Sky TV in the UK, and The Sun tabloid in London (the actual list is much longer, but you get my drift...). Oh, and don't forget that they own MySpace.

You may have already realized that he owns the Fox News cable network, where he has encouraged a biased political slant to the reporting that conforms to his own conservative political views (the founding head of that network left a career as a Republican media consultant to start this propaganda machine). As I've mentioned before, there has long been a campaign among conservatives to label any news organization "liberal" if it reports in any manner they disagree with, regardless of whether it's truthful and fair. Fox News is the centerpiece of this strategy, although at least they stopped using the disingenuous slogan "We Report, You Decide".

Here's what really bothers me about Mr. Murdoch and his people: They all preach conservative values in their shows and columns, but they never criticize Mr. Murdoch. This in spite of the fact that he owns DirecTV, one of the largest pornography distributors in the country (think of all the pay-per-view adult material it distributes). His paper, The Sun of London, puts a gorgeous topless woman on page three every day for solely prurient reasons (I freely admit to having spotted them a few times, Google Keeley Hazell or Gemma Atkinson if you aren't at work or around kids). How can you possibly shelter kids from this stuff when it's in something as ubiquitous as a paper like The Sun? Mr. Murdoch and his companies are all about conservative values on the air or on the page--until it's profitable for them to lose those "values".

Now, I don't really oppose adult content--much. I would like to observe that the stuff is faintly toxic and harms nearly everybody it touches. Still, I've seen a bit of it here and there and I'm not screaming to ban it because it will "protect children". I just think that Mr. Murdoch should hear it from his "conservative" commentators--that he's a pornographer and he should stop.

Can I just once hear a Fox News host say that Mr. Murdoch should change his ways?

CDs listened to today:

• Matias Aguayo: Are You Really Lost
• Olivier Messiaen: Turangalila-Symphonie (Simon Rattle Conducting)
  

CD review time!

Today's review is Peter Lieberson's King Gesar. Mr. Lieberson is an American composer who has produced a nice range of works, perhaps with a strength in piano and voice (perhaps not surprising, considering his late wife was a highly-respected singer). He's still active, thankfully, and this work is from 1992, showing a hint of the eclecticism that a lot of composers and other musicians picked up during the 1960s and 70s.

King Gesar is written for nine musicians and is a kind of sprechstimme tale taken from Tibetan legend. The instrumentation is a rather idiosyncratic mix with a percussionist, two pianos, cello, flute, horn, clarinet, and trombone, giving me the impression it was written for some very specific players. On this disk, we're lucky to have big-time musicians like pianists Peter Serkin and Emanuel Ax, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, and trombonist David Taylor to perform. The heart of the piece is the narration of the tale, sometimes sung, sometimes spoken, and occasionally chanted here by Omar Ebrahim (whose performance is neatly judged, save for a touch of prissiness here and there).

The interesting thing about this work is that it's dominated by Douglas Penick's beautifully worded libretto and the story leaps into the imagination. Lieberson's music is so perfectly melded to the text and the voice part seems to flow naturally from the text as a single, unified piece that even after repeated listens, I still get excited by the story, laugh at the jolts of humor, and wonder at the moments of magic.

10 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Henryk Gorecki: Symphony No. 3
• Kassav': Majestik Zouk
• Esa-Pekka Salonen: L.A. Variations
• Peter Lieberson: King Gesar
• Kenny Wheeler: Music For Large & Small Ensembles
• Gerry Mulligan: Compact Jazz

I'm gonna review a CD!

I've been a big fan of tenor sax player Tom Scott since I was in middle school. It's because of some of his recorded performances in the 1970s, which were pretty exciting stuff! When I was going through my recent phase of buying jazz disks (because I didn't have any interesting pop CDs I wanted to buy), I remembered my excitement back in the day and on a whim, bought Tom Scott's Bebop United.

It's a live recording featuring some big-name musicians like trumpeter Randy Brecker and alto saxophonist Phil Woods. The band is four or five horns (Mr. Woods isn't playing on every tune, I gather) plus rhythm section and Mr. Scott arranges a grab bag of well-known tunes in the style of the late 1950s plus some originals. The arrangements are good quality, but hardly sublime, and the rhythm section is a bit stodgy, weighed down by drummer Willie Jones III's leaden timekeeping and Mr. Scott's pal, Gil Goldstein doesn't improve things with some rather ordinary playing. Hey, at least the tunes are engaging.

None of the soloists generate much excitement, but everybody is competent and Mr. Scott remains an ingratiating presence. Perhaps his tone and style have faded since his glory days, when he had a bright, searing tone and was willing to extend the climaxes of his solos with intense upper-range work. Instead, this disk features a mellower tone and approach from Mr. Scott (and no soprano sax work), that doesn't serve him well. His improvisations are suspiciously well thought-out, making me wonder if he wasn't doing much on-the spot creation. The rest of the group follows suit, and nobody rises above a generally pleasant kind of jazz--frequently, it's not even pleasant. This is a simple, pat outing with little to recommend it besides a good professional band that is incapable of stinking.

3 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Alban Berg: Lyric Suite for String Quartet
• Marshall Crenshaw: Life's Too Short
• Gyorgy Ligeti: Requiem
• Elliott Carter: Variations for Orchestra
• Kenny Wheeler: Music For Large & Small Ensembles
• Garbage: Beautiful
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain
  

I've been pretty good about exercising lately.

I don't get people who work out in the gym. It's so gosh-darned boring! My best fitness activities are the ones that I consider recreation, rather than exercise (remember what Covert Bailey said: the best exercise for you is the one you'll do!).

During the winter, it's hard to go skiing enough to consider that sufficient exercise (although on the days I do it, it most definitely is sufficient). That means going with my one other choice: bicycling indoors. It's crushingly boring to just sit there, turning the pedals. So I try to watch TV while I do that--but there's a TV writers strike and no new shows to watch!

Last night, I watched House Of Flying Daggers while I exercised. Problem is, the movie was nearly two hours long and I only needed 30-40 minutes of exercise time. Call me OCD (see the comments, you won't be the first), but I don't really like watching a movie over a span of days. that means I was stuck watching the movie for much longer than I wanted. And I kinda resent that the movie was in dubbed Chinese, meaning I had to pay more attention to read the subtitles--no blogging, cleaning, reading the news while the movie was on.

It probably means I'll be watching a lot of cooking shows while I cycle to avoid the movie problem...

CDs listened to today:

• Remy Shand: The Way I Feel
• Jesus Guridi: Sinfonia Pirenaica
• World Party: Goodbye Jumbo
• Ingram Marshall: Hymnodic Delays
• Ludwig van Beethoven: Mass in C Major
• Kenny Wheeler: Music For Large & Small Ensembles
  
• Louis Armstrong: Volume II: The Hot Fives and Sevens
• stellastarr*: (eponymous)

I'll never forget French crepes.

A month or two ago, I spotted a new restaurant called Boba Crepes. After my summer 2006 visit to France, I'm more fond of crepes than ever. Seeing that sign, I had a rush of memories about the tasty street food--and restaurant fare--I had in Paris and the Pyrenees.

I finally got to visit the restaurant on Monday and I'm a bit disappointed. It's actually more Asian-influenced than Gallic in its flavors. My hopes for revisiting those marvelous egg, cheese, ham, and butter crepes (somebody told me that's called a "crèpe complète") were instantly dashed. all the crepes there are offered with mayonnaise, cucumber, and a couple of other suspiciously non-French-sounding additions. I stuck with the simple option and got a ham and cheese crepe. It was fine, although the crepe tasted suspiciously like it was bought pre-made from an industrial purveyor (fresh-frozen and individually packaged for convenience, I'm sure!).

Now the other thing that lets you know that this is more of an Asian restaurant is that the bubble tea selections are more extensive than the crepe choices. I can't say I've been spending a lot of time looking forward to having drinks with tapioca balls in them, but this was my chance to try a bubble tea--except I went for a strawberry bubble slushy (why do they call them "bobas"?). The tapioca balls are a very dark grayish-brown and look kinda scary in a friendly pink slushy. They taste slightly burnt and I really don't get the appeal.

I probably won't visit there again, particularly considering it cost about $9. Thankfully, there's a good burger place and a Mongolian BBQ in the same strip mall!

CDs listened to today:

• Bill Frisell Quartet: (eponymous)
• Alexander Scriabin: The Symphonies, disk 1
• The Time: Pandemonium
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 10 (Gerard Schwarz conducting)
• Ralph Vaughan-Williams: Symphony No. 5
• Kenny Wheeler: Music For Large & Small Ensembles
• Various Artists: Northern Exposure: Sasha & John Digweed, disk 1

No I don't write all my posts on the day they're posted.

Merry Christmas. It's time for a CD review! I picked up this disk, which is titled Illuminations and features the trombone soloist, Joseph Alessi, simply because I'm always looking for more recorded trombone works. I file this as T-bone Concerto by Johan de Meij according to my own idiosyncratic way of organizing my classical music.

Mr. Alessi is the principal trombonist for the New York Philharmonic Orchestra and a regular on the trombone soloist circuit (hey, that's not such a lucrative gig that a fellow can give up the day job in New York). He's a superb musician with an unerring feel for phrasing and great technique on one of the most difficult instruments in the orchestra and he's working here with the New Mexico Wind Symphony, a pretty good group for accompaniment, even if their sound isn't perfectly polished. As I write this, I realize that there was a time when classical recording reviews used to always mention the recording quality. You know, I really almost never hear recordings that aren't at least "pretty good" in terms of sound quality. This disk is certainly in that category and I'll probably never mention the topic again.

The disk is organized very much like a recital for Mr. Alessi, featuring the kinds of straightforward, tuneful works in which he typically shines. Three of the works are by the famed trombonist of the Sousa era, Arthur Pryor. Pryor's tunes always make me think of the municipal band shell you find in Midwestern parks, where you might have once heard works like these four-square tunes. A couple of the other works are in this same vein, with two more serious works rounding out the disk: the de Meij and Joseph Turrin's Illuminations. I found the Turrin work especially fine, with a lovely structure and nice melodies. Still, the overall feel of the disk is a bit lightweight, with the possible exception of the de Meij. After listening through, you may feel a little like you still haven't heard something substantial (hey, this could just be my taste for atonal music surfacing with such a tonal disk).

7 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Frank Sinatra: The Best Of the Columbia Years, 1943-1952, disk 3

"I'm just trying to be a better person."

I went to the lighting store last weekend to buy a light bulb--a very expensive light bulb. It turns out that a three-way compact fluorescent bulb costs about $10! Clever me, as I reached my car and switched hands with the bulb, I dropped it, breaking the darned thing despite the protective packaging. So I march back into the store to buy another and ask them to throw out the broken one. I suppose I had a tiny hope that, like a little kid who drops his ice cream cone, if I showed them what happened, they'd give me a free replacement. I was completely up-front about the damage and sure enough, the Lamps Plus guy took pity on me! Free replacement! I swear that I was fully prepared to spend the extra money, but I feel OK about it because I was honest.

Yet, I wait to be honest on another matter. For the record, I will come forward, but am willing to wait in the hope that things turn out in my favor. The hotel where I stayed last month in Vancouver appears to have processed my payment incorrectly, charging me for one night instead of five. I'm waiting before I call, partly in the hope that they find the error and correct it, but probably more in the hope that by the time I call, they'll feel it's too far gone to correct the error! I aim to wait about 30 days, then contact the business. While I'm skirting the ragged edge of integrity where you have to consider that I still possess the intent to report the error--because I haven't actually done the forthright thing--I believe I'm still honest.

Still, I'm not sure if it's entirely ethical. This may be an example of lie number two!

CDs listened to today:

• William Schuman: Symphony No. 9
• Steve Reich: Drumming
  

I'm desperate to see health-care reform in the United States.

But I'm not so desperate that I'll consider supporting the plans proposed by the Democratic candidates for president. Nearly all of them are proposing a health-care plan that continues the practice of tying one's health insurance to one's employment.

First, why should my employer have to participate in administering my health insurance? They have enough to do, thank you, and they really don't have any business sticking their noses in my health. Plus, this is an expensive burden for businesses. I gather business organizations are eager to see this change--especially small businesses where the cost is much higher, proportionately. Second, you still have to build a secondary system of insurance for those who are either not employed or not employed in any traditional sense.

Of course one Democrat isn't proposing an employer-based system. Dennis Kucinich, in an effort to be the true believer in all things that the far left of the party desires, wants to simply have the government take over all health care. That's a non-starter for me! First, insurance companies would collapse, along with a fair number of hospital systems, unless they became the administrators of the government-paid health system. So, now you've managed to add a layer of federal bureaucracy to the health-care system without getting rid of the insurance companies. Congratulations, sir!

How about this? We require every insurance company to offer a minimum package of health benefits as a condition of staying in business (say, preventive, emergency, prescription drug, and other necessary care with no co-pay, plus a wide choice of physicians and hospitals). The federal government then reimburses each health insurance company for every subscriber to their plans at a fixed rate. The insurers can offer more than the minimum in this basic plan if they wish to try and attract more subscribers--they can also offer plans that exceed the minimum and charge whatever fee they think people will pay for the premium plans and the feds will still reimburse the basic rate.

In order to stay profitable, the insurers will need to keep costs down with hospitals, drug companies, and physicians. We'll rely on them to keep costs down as a profit motive--but there would be heavy penalties for refusing claims that are ruled to be legitimate by the feds. And one more thing: we'll allow insurers to band together to negotiate rates with physicians, hospitals and drug companies. Did you know that's illegal? It seems one problem with health care today is that the powerful lobbies for the drug companies and other providers have managed to greatly limit competition in the health-care economy. It needs to stop and not one national candidate from either party has said a word about this.

Sorry for the free-market lecture.

CDs listened today:

• Esa-Pekka Salonen: L.A. Variations
• Peter Lieberson: Garland
• The Muffs: Blonder and Blonder
• Matias Aguayo: Are You Really Lost
• Olivier Messiaen: Turangalila-Symphonie (Myung-Whun Chung conducting)
• Edith Piaf: The Very Best Of Edith Piaf
  

I'm still ticked off about taxes.

Nobody seems to have noticed this--and the mainstream news media is too afraid to report this with the emphasis it deserves. With the recent congressional action to reform the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT), they essentially gave a huge tax cut to families making between $150,000 and $860,000 (more or less--those numbers are very hard to pin down).

Democrats in Congress apparently wanted to either raise other taxes to pay for the tax cut, but the president and Republican legislators wouldn't do that. So now the federal budget deficit will increase by about $50 billion dollars because the president and his party's anti-tax crazies would rather try to pin the "tax-and-spend" label on the opposing party and borrow money to pay for his mis-managed war from China (Chinese banks and investors are the largest purchasers of federal treasury obligations, I gather).

Not only are we financing a war by borrowing from other countries, we'll not make 7% interest payments on the AMT to the tune of $3.5 billion--to foreign investors.

CDs listened to today:

• Gyorgy Ligeti: Requiem
• Elliott Carter: Symphony No. 1
• Garbage: Version 2.0
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain
• Henryk Gorecki: Quartet for Strings No. 2
• Kaiser Chiefs: Employment
  

I'm all steamed up about tax policy.

My sister and I had one of those conversations. Every once in a while, we talk politics and government policy and we were talking tax policy again after the Congress temporarily reformed the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT). Sadly, our nation's tax policy is more of a social and economic policy than a mechanism to raise revenue for government operations--and it's a distorted mess that favors the wealthy. In fact, the original purpose of the AMT was to correct the problem of the wealthiest taxpayers using endless loopholes and deductions to pay lower tax rates than the so-called "middle class".

Consider the capital gains tax: It's intended to reward investment to keep businesses healthy with fresh money infused into healthy capital markets. In fact, it's a lower tax rate than the taxes that we pay on most of our income earned through things like salaries. And who makes most of their money on investments? The wealthiest citizens!

This is why I sometimes start to complain about taxes and that I agree with Steve Forbes, that we should have a flat tax. As a reminder, a flat income tax simply asks you for a set percentage of your income, regardless of how much--or how little--you make. While it puts the huge industry of tax experts, lawyers, and accountants out of business, it's another way of skewing tax policy in favor of the rich. After all, if you make the annual amount that the federal government calls "poverty level", say, $21,000 for a family of four, you would pay $2,100. Now, a person making ten times that pays ten times as much tax, so that seems equitable to some. The thing is that the impoverished person is left with $18,900 t0 pay the rent, grocery bills, for clothes and, somehow, health insurance. It's a lot easier to afford a $21,000 tax bill when you have another $189,000 to spend. I'll never support a true flat tax.

Still, I'm ready for tax fairness via a radically simplified policy. Let's start by getting rid of nearly every deduction. I'll allow you to keep your personal deductions as well as the ones for dependents. I'll even agree to a mortgage-interest deduction, limited to, say, ten times the median amount paid by all mortgage-holders (I like it when we allow for a certain amount of inflation protection for these things--but we use the median, not the average, or the wealthiest would push up mortgage sizes to their own advantage). And only one residence would qualify. Once we do that, let's agree to, say, three tax rates, rising to a highest rate for the wealthiest--and everything counts as income, including capital gains! I suppose we'll also need a provision to allow people to protect capital gains from home sales and turn those profits over into a replacement home.

And if you want to cut taxes, you can cut them for everybody by simply raising the standard deduction. This would mean a far greater benefit for the poorest when we cut tax rates. The wealthiest would actually get the same reduction in taxes, dollar for dollar, although their overall tax rates certainly wouldn't decline like the poorest people's rates would! And really, if you cut everybody's taxes by $100 per year, who needs the $100 more, the poor guy or Bill Gates? Why should Mr. Gates get a better deal than the guy who really needs it?

Now I know we would still need to make a few exceptions for the unfortunate people who encounter health crises and perhaps natural disasters, but let's stop with making a tax policy that allows the wealthy to manipulate the system in ways the poor can't even begin to imagine.

CDs listened to today:

• The Wonderstuff: Never Loved Elvis
• Remy Shand: The Way I Feel
• Ingram Marshall: Hymnodic Delays
• Ludwig van Beethoven: Incidental Music to Kotzebue's "König Stephan"
• Louis Armstrong: Volume I, The Hot Fives
• stellastarr*: (eponymous)
• Alban Berg: 3 Orchesterstucke
• Marshall Crenshaw: Field Day
  

I've decided I'm allowed to get lazy now and then.

So here's another video for you. I gather this is an ad for a fictional product from a little-seen Mike Judge movie, Idiocracy. You may recall he's the evil genius behind Beavis and Butthead, plus he's the creator of Office Space. The gag here is that the future will be a land of morons completely formed by the worst of mass-marketing and Hollywood. Here's a product from the movie, now with it's own ad (apparently, you can actually buy this stuff):




CDs listened to today:

• Stephen Scott: Minerva's Web
• Justin Timberlake: Justified
• Bill Frisell Quartet: (eponymous)
• Edgard Varese: Ameriques
• Various Artists: Music From The Morning Of The World
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 10 (conducted by Gerard Schwarz)
• Alban Berg: Lulu-Suite
  

I know you want a CD review now.

This disk was a gift from a former girlfriend. She bought it off my Amazon.com wish list where I had placed it on a whim. I probably wouldn't have bought this myself; I use that wish list a bit like a placeholder list for items I might buy--after a little consideration. But this is the sort of risk I take in order to expand my horizons, musically speaking. If you occasionally take a risk and listen to something you wouldn't ordinarily hear, you never know what you might find.

I put this disk on my wish list because it's named for the Pyrenees mountains and at the time, I was still pretty jazzed by my two-week bicycle ride there.

The disk is Sinfonica Pirenaica, by Jesus Guridi. The symphony is a rather traditional four-movement work. Labeled as three movements, the middle movement is really two--a fast and a slow inner movement. While the harmonies aren't overly dissonant, they are rich and they support some beautiful melodies and straightforward rhythms. Some of the development sections seem a little wayward and Mr. Guridi seems to have mistaken plainness for stylistic unity. Nothing here will jump out as exciting and the handling of orchestral timbres is a trifle uninteresting.

The Bilbao Symphony is featured here, led by Juan Jose Mena, and they create a polish to the sound that highlights the work's tunefulness at the cost of shining a spotlight on the frumpy soundscape. I'd be happy to hear more from this band. The disk closes with a dance excerpt from Guridi's ballet, Amaya, and the orchestra sounds like it's having a bunch of fun.

6 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Esa-Pekka Salonen: L.A. Variations
• Olivier Messiaen: Trois Petites Liturgies de la Presence Divine
• The Philosopher Kings: (eponymous)
• Matias Aguayo: Are You Really Lost
• Steve Reich: Different Trains
• Frank Sinatra: The Best Of the Columbia Years, 1943-1952, disk 3
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 9
  

I'm enjoying the Hollywood writers strike.

I think every NBC program I watch has now aired an announcement that the show will return in 2008. The other networks are in the same boat, with most scripted shows having already stopped production due to the strike.

Now my TiVos are caught up--no programs that need viewing, more or less--and I can spend more time reading, writing, and listening to music.

Maybe the strike will lead the networks to change their ways and develop new programming in a different way. I saw an article online recently that mentioned that the cable networks have canceled less than half of the shows they debuted this year. Meanwhile the traditional broadcast networks have canceled more than two-thirds of their new programs from this fall.

The difference? I'm not sure, but here's the theory: the broadcast networks treat development of programming as a "volume business." They put nearly any idea that can get their hands on into a development cycle, wasting their money in great flurries of shows that'll never see the light of day. They even produce dozens of awful pilots that never get aired, but cost a big ol' bag of money to assemble. And yet, despite this lengthy winnowing process, they end up putting Cavemen on prime time.

What's the problem? The big four networks have executives who love good-quality dramas and comedies in the same way that a McDonald's executive loves fine dining--it has nothing to do with their business. In terms of mass culture, it's not just TV and fast food where big business poisons things, it's the music industry, too. In each of these industries, the big companies' executives refer to what they sell as "product" rather than art or craft. They don't care if what they sell is any good, just that it's cheaper to produce than it is to sell--and that they sell it in huge volumes.

And what does the TV industry sell?

You! Or at least, your eyeballs...

CDs listened to today:

• Garbage: (eponymous)
• Gyorgy Ligeti: Requiem
• Alberto Ginastera: Quartet for Strings No. 2
• Jungle Brothers: Done By The Forces Of Nature
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain
• Peter Lieberson: Drala
• Bob Mould: Workbook
  

This sounds like science fiction.

Neurobiologists recently announced they could change the sexual preference of fruit flies with a chemical. One of the researchers feels that this technique could eventually be applied to human beings.

Imagine that!

Still, I think that human sexual behavior is so much more complex than fruit flies that the pills might change some basic urges, but not the veritable railroad track of behavior laid down by our years of habits and thoughts. I suppose that this could become a recreational drug at some time, provided human sexual behavior and thinking ever became so ambiguous that one could easily conceive of "switching teams". I wonder what this would do for the truly bisexual?

As for me, I'm pretty conservative about mood-altering drugs in general and I wonder what kind of therapeutic benefit this could ever produce. Would this allow society to announce once and for all that homosexuality is a pathological matter? After all, if you can "cure" it, wouldn't that give weight to the argument that this is a disorder? In doing so, don't we diminish the human dignity of those who are gay? After all, a human being is a complex miracle and a huge part of who we are is our sexuality (sorry for the religious reference). How is reversing such a basic urge and fundamental part of who we are a good thing? It won't prevent disease, make you thrive, or allow you to live longer. What good is that?

CDs listened to today:

• Ludwig von Beethoven: The Diabelli Variations
• the apples in stereo: Fun Trick Noisemaker
• Jesus Guridi: Sinfonia Pirenaica
• Alban Berg: Concerto for Violin
• Elvis Costello: When I Was Cruel
• stellastarr*: (eponymous)
• Elliott Carter: Symphonia: Sum Fluxae Pretium Spei
  

"To be perfectly honest."

I used to have a boss who would say that phrase every time she would lie to me. I think I value honesty more than most people. To me, it's the heart of human relationships. Of course, I majored in Philosophy in college, where I was required to take a course in Ethics (possibly because they feared I didn't understand the difference between right and wrong).

I mention this because I recently encountered a woman I dated briefly a few years ago. The relationship was ever-so-brief and we never really had a spark. I encountered her a couple of years later and didn't recall her at first, so she took advantage of that and, well, played me by trying to initiate the whole romantic thing a second time without bothering to remind me of the first time (hey, this was email, so it was easy to do). When she revealed the deceit, I was rather disgusted at the ploy. Well, I encountered her again recently and because my trust had been previously abused, I cut off the entire conversation as quickly as possible.

But nobody is perfect and there's no such thing as perfect honesty.

I've been lied to and I've told some lies myself. Yes, I'm embarrassed by the latter! Still, there are at least four kinds of lies that can ruin human relationships.

The first is the traditional lie, where you simply say something that isn't true, usually to get--or keep--something you want. Now, since what you want isn't always a material thing, a lot of lies in human interaction aim to gain or preserve a status. Sometimes we lie simply to start or preserve the relationship, or even to destroy it. I once dated a woman who concealed the fact that she had a child from me. I can't say what I would have done if she had been truthful, but I think you know what happened when I figured it out.

The second lie is the lie of omission. While the first kind of lie is usually a conscious decision to say the opposite of what is true, this is the lie where social conventions demand that you disclose something--but you choose not to. This is the lie the woman I mentioned encountering a second and third time told.

The third lie is the saddest of all in human relations: the unknowing lie. This isn't fully intentional, but happens when you have reached a point in your personal development that you no longer are even capable of revealing what's true about yourself, your life, the people in your life, or even trivial things. While the person who commits this isn't fully responsible, this kind of deceit is just as destructive to trust as the conscious lie. On the other hand, we each have a duty to know ourselves well enough to minimize the harm of this. And if you know of someone like this, you know what a hazard they are to their own relationships.

The fourth lie is the broken promise. I think it was a song lyric I heard once that said, "promises are lies that haven't come true yet." This was the specialty of that old boss of mine--and her assistant. Yes, we all agree that life sometimes interferes with our promises and nobody keeps their word every time, but promises of loyalty, faithfulness, support, and things that aren't subject to circumstance can pretty much always be kept. Still, we all need a way to withdraw from those compacts (you know, like divorces), making the line between betrayal and fair notice as fine as can be.

What's my point? First, a plea for all to be as honest as possible. Second, a reminder to all that deceit is the most terrible thing you can do. It shreds the fabric of our relationships and even our society. Please, keep your promises, don't conceal, don't lie, and be self-aware enough to avoid harming your own relations with the lies of ignorance.

And if somebody feels the need to tell you that they're being honest or open, get ready! The next thing they say probably isn't true!

CDs listened to today:

• Bill Frisell Quartet: (eponymous)
• Ellen Taaffe Zwilich: Symphony No. 2, "Cello"
• Peter Wolf: Up To No Good
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 10 (Gerard Schwarz conducting)
• Remy Shand: The Way I Feel
  

And it's time for another CD review.

Z by My Morning Jacket (MMJ) is another disk that I discovered in the standard fashion: learn about the disk from a review or a TV ad or something, download a sample, listen a few times, make a decision to purchase. I know, a kinda boring and conservative approach.

One thing that has been annoying me about a lot of less-famous bands (the music press likes to call them "indie" acts) is that they often feature singers who sound like they're afraid to really sing. They timidly push the notes and words out in pinched, thin voices that only highlight the bombast and over-the-top singing of your standard-issue American Idol competitor. My Morning Jacket's singer, (you can't make a name like this up) Jim James, is not one of those frightened singers. He mostly sings in the back of his throat, but at full-volume when needed and with a rich tone unusual in rock music nowadays. He also eschews much in the way of ornamentation, letting the melody's beauty speak for itself.

Withe a few exceptions, MMJ's Z favors stately mid-tempo numbers and ostinato-style arrangements that favor static grooves over harmonic movement. The music press will tell you this is a hallmark of what they like to call "jam bands", meaning acts that favor long, improvised instrumental passages in concert. While I usually don't care for this kind of approach, the album's songs are mostly tight affairs with little of the tedious noodling that can dominate jam-band material and the lack of harmonic progression seems more serene and centered than aimless. The languid feel is enhanced by the vocal melodies which have a serene, stately sweep--it's easy to get caught up in the tunes, even when the tempos are a bit brisker and the band gets a touch livelier.

It's hard to imagine dancing to this recording, given the placid approach that permeates even the energetic songs, but this is some great listening.

8 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Various Artists: Logical Progressions, disk 2
  

It's not a keeper, but…

I've been working through some of the old sample songs on my iPod--songs I listen to a few times, then decide if they're worth paying for. The other night, I worked my way through songs from the critics' darlings, Art Brut. I won't be paying for any of their songs; their singer doesn't really sing--he shouts. That's a tough practice for a a band that wants to be musically successful, because even with a skilled shouter who manages to project a wide variety in tone, pitch and expression, it still isn't tuneful and isn't melodies you'll want to sing later. The Hold Steady and Louis XIV are bands that do a little better at this ploy.

But the songs are funny and sarcastic--if a little too snarky and clever. I wanted to tell you about one song, "Good Weekend", where he brags about his weekend and the woman he met. This line in one of the verses is too funny: "I've seen her naked!" he enthuses, "TWICE!"

CDs listened to today

• Steve Reich: The Desert Music
• Frank Sinatra: The Best Of The Columbia Years, 1943-1952, disk 2
• Matias Aguayo: Are You Really Lost
• Salvatore Sciarrino: Infinito nero
• The Thrills: So Much For The City
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 9
• Vladimir Ussachevsky: Line Of Apogee
  

It's CD review day!

Why did I buy a disk featuring Alban Berg's Lulu-Suite? Berg is one of the composers I find most interesting and I eventually want to have every major work from his pen--along with Messiaen, Schoenberg, Beethoven, Stravinsky… Give me a few more minutes and I can probably think of a half-dozen more composers who are that important to me! If you'd like to learn more about Herr Berg, you can visit the AllMusic.com page about him. Mostly what I'd like you to know is that he was one of the first composers who could be called "atonal". He actually wasn't particularly atonal, truth be told, since that means a style of music where all pitches are equally important. He tended to have a central, primary pitch for his works and simply followed a rather different set of rules to get there!

The Lulu-Suite is beautifully played here by the London Symphony Orchestra, showing the dark lyricism of Berg's opera highlights with great balance and giving his slow-motion rhythms a bit more movement than we usually find. Like his other opera, Wozzeck, Berg seems to get a little lost, melodically speaking, and the tunes can be a bit stiff--especially the featured vocal melody in the suite.

Claudio Abbado is the conductor for all three works here, including the Three Orchestra Pieces--which every label uses to fill up a Berg disk. The Three Pieces are not Berg's best works, nor his most famous, but this is another good recording of them (in case you haven't heard them before, you'll do fine with this disk). The CD is rounded out with the less-familiar Altenberg Songs suite, sung by Margaret Price. She really gets Berg's way with a melody and melts the phrases beautifully with just enough tartness to keep the old master's occasionally cloying melodies from becoming too rich.

The Altenberg Songs aren't the strongest work and Abbado's leadership is fine, but there is nothing on this disk that so distinguishes the performances to deserve a very high ranking. I suppose that's the worst thing I can say!

7 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Vittorio Giannini: Symphony No. 3
• Jesus Jones: Doubt
• Gyorgy Ligeti: Requiem
• Frank Ezra Levy: Symphony No. 4, "Structures of the Mind"
• Bob Mould: Black Sheets Of Rain
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain
• Olivier Messiaen: Quatre Etudes de Rhythme
• Sam Phillips: Fan Dance
• Esa-Pekka Salonen: L.A. Variations
  

Do you have time for this?

My blog's most devoted reader--perhaps the only reader!--sent me a SlashDot.org link a couple of days ago.

The SlashDot mob marked a story from Wired magazine about people who are fascinated by high-tech time devices and measuring time on the most fundamental and precise level possible. There's a quote in the article that you have to read:

If you have one clock ... you are peaceful and have no worries. If you have two clocks ... you start asking, "What time is it, really?"

The perfect way of thinking about timekeeping!

And the subjects of the Wired program call themselves the "Time Nuts". Couldn't they call themselves the "Time Lords" or another cool name?

By the way, I think the reason he sent it to me was to establish once and for all that I have OCD--despite my denials. In my defense, I only keep my Mac on accurate time by synchronizing it with the National Institute of Standards and Technology's (NIST) time server, which is pretty effortless. I can live with that! If you're interested in learning more and getting your computer synced up, visit the NIST page for more. Although I admit that when I look at my watch and then compare it with my cell phone's time, it really annoys me when they don't match ("what time is it, really?").

But do visit the SlashDot.org page about the story and read the users' comments. There are a lot of puns and cracking wise worth reading there!

CDs listened to today:

• Ludwig van Beethoven: The Creatures of Prometheus
  
• Fiona Apple: When The Pawn Breaks...
• My Morning Jacket: Z
• Alban Berg: Chamber Concerto
• Elvis Costello: All This Useless Beauty
• Jesus Guridi: Sinfonia Pirenaica
• Elliott Carter: The String Quartets, disk 2
• The Futureheads: (eponymous)
• stellastarr*: (eponymous)
  

Whose fault is it?

I was sick a good part of last week, my recent posts are undoubtedly fruits of lying in bed for four days with little to do all day. One of the thoughts I have now that I'm feeling better is this: what could I have done to avoid the illness? I'm certainly not saying it's all my fault that I got a nasty cold--these things happen. But am I taking care of myself to the best of my ability to stay healthy? Not only avoiding colds, but overall?

The answer, of course, is no, I'm not doing all I can. And I won't do all I can, but I might try to do better. Hey, nobody's perfect, but there's room for improvement here. I could sleep more and better, eat better, wash my hands more often, work less, stress less, and exercise more. I'm not playing blame the victim, but when a bad thing happens to me, I feel like I need to consider things and decide if it's worth it to make the changes needed to avoid a re-occurrence. In a way, this is related to a rape-prevention thing a friend forwarded to me recently. If you're raped, or get a cold, or any of a zillion bad things between those opposite ends of the "bad things" spectrum, it's truly not your fault and sometimes, they happen when you've taken no risk at all. But there are things you can do to reduce the overall risk those bad things will happen to you.

Naturally, nobody is willing to do everything they should to avoid the bad things in life--risks are a natural part of life--but I'm one of those people who thinks a lot about these tradeoffs. I'm willing to try and focus a little better on the things I mentioned to avoid colds, particularly sleep, stress, and fitness (I'm already pretty good about hand-washing, honest). Perversely, our efforts to reduce risk don't always pay off and sometimes, the efforts aren't necessary--you just never really know. So we all just need to find a balance and be satisfied with our honest efforts.

Maybe I should devote a little more time to what I should consider doing to prevent a burglary at my house?

CDs listened to today:

• Matias Aguayo: Are You Really Lost
• Joan Tower: Concerto for Orchestra
• Various Artists: Logical Progression, disk 1
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 9
• Hebert Vazquez: String Quartet No. 1
• Kai Winding, J.J. Johnson & Bennie Green: Trombone By Three
• Bill Frisell Quartet: (eponymous)
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 10 (Gerard Schwarz conducting)
• Remy Shand: The Way I Feel
  

Another key to happiness?

I don't remember where I heard this. Basically, the advice was to find what makes you happy and do it. Then you will find true love when you find somebody who's greatest joy is seeing you happy.

I'm not sure I entirely agree with that, but I like the sentiment--plus I'm certainly going to agree that it's up to each of us to make our own selves happy. I know we're not born knowing this; and our parents don't always know how to teach this. But still, there's a point where we can't complain about circumstances or the mistakes we've made that put us where we are. It's hard sometimes to see our way through life's compromises and detours to happiness. But really, do you ever want to give that responsibility to others? I mean, they can't even get you good Christmas gifts consistently!

For me, that starts with setting some goals (both small and large ones) and agreeing with myself that I need to be happy that I've made them. Return to college and graduate? Check. Cycle across the country? Check. Reaching the goals is only part of what has made me happier and more satisfied with my life (not perfectly happy--this is life, not a romance novel). The journey and the sacrifices I've made to get those goals (hey, sometimes I've been more disciplined than others) really do add meaning. Call me existentialist, but we are also responsible for the meaning in our lives just as we foot the bill for the happiness.

I gotta say, though, some of life's goals are harder than others. First, you have to figure out what you truly want (the things that will bring happiness), then how to get it. It piles up and can overwhelm you. What do I truly want to give up to get that? How can I make the personal changes that I need to reach some of the bigger life goals (college was a big change for me)? How about meeting my responsibilities and obligations that I've either chosen or life has handed me while reaching for the new goals? And am I really willing to make the sacrifices for some of these?

I'm actually in the middle of a period where my discipline is pretty good. These things come and go, as they do for most of us, but just the progress I'm making is a start that satisfies. As for true love? Well, that's still up to me.

CDs listened to today:

• Gyorgy Ligeti: Requiem
• Olivier Messiaen: Poemes pour Mi
• Sam Phillips: A Boot And A Shoe
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain
• H. Owen Reed: La Fiesta Mexicana
• Frank Sinatra: The Best Of The Columbia Years, 1943-1952, disk 1
• Esa-Pekka Salonen: L.A. Variations
• Joseph Schwantner: In Aeternum (Consortium IV)
• 3rd Bass: Derelicts Of Dialect
  

Key to happiness?

I'm not the kind of guy who gets terribly religious, but also not the kind who likes to speak ill of the faithful (until they try to tell me what to do). Still, if I were forced to choose a faith to follow, it would probably be a particularly purified form of Zen Buddhism. I mention this because the TV show, Life, has a character who tries to follow the precepts of Zen.

Here's the thing: Is our affinity for a particular faith more than just a quirk of personality? This struck me when the TV show had a pair of episodes named for a Zen exercise: dig a hole and fill it up. The idea behind the exercise is that the activity doesn't take a lot of thought and is utterly pointless--which is kinda the point, if you'll forgive the perverse way of putting it... Well, the real point of the hole-digging is to allow you to focus on the task, meaningless as it is, and in doing so, empty your mind of those restless thoughts and simply become present and mindful. As in, become one with the universe and all that good Zen stuff.

My puzzlement is, how is this different from the way a person with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) would calm themselves and become more "present"? Now, you only have to peruse my blog archives for a while to see that I, perhaps compulsively, keep a listening journal. I freely admit to an occasional urge to be compulsive, is that why I find Zen appealing? What does that say about personality type and other faiths?

For the record, I don't think I truly suffer from OCD. My musical journaling isn't a fetish that leaves me anxious when I don't do it--although my iPod and iTunes means always knowing what I listened to and when.

CDs listened to today:

• Benjamin Lees: Concerto for French Horn and Orchestra
• Paul Motian Trio: Trioism
  

I almost agree.

But not quite. There's been a big fuss in Washington lately about the CIA. It seems that they destroyed videotapes of interrogations of terror suspects. Reading between the lines, I'd say that the CIA destroyed the tapes for two reasons: to conceal the fact that they were torturing people and to conceal other methods--not to mention the interrogators' identities. Apparently, they did this against the advice of the White House counsel's office, so I think we need to acknowledge that the administration can't be blamed for this one (that's a nice change, isn't it?).

Since we can't blame the President and his staff for this one, let's set aside the political rhetoric and look at what the real issues are. First, the CIA is rightly concerned that they may be held accountable for torture once the current administration leaves office. Can we pretty please stop the torture? Even if you call it by other names like "waterboarding" or "attention slap", it's still torture and cruelty. How can we be a people that tortures?

Second, if you set aside the question about the torture, I agree about destroying records. The CIA should destroy records regarding sources and methods. Intelligence methods aren't safe and secure without keeping the people who do them secret, along with their methods.

I'm overdue for a CD review.

I recall this CD purchase easily. This is one that follows my normal practice. I read a review online, probably at the New York Times, then located some sample songs, gave them a few listens on the iPod, then purchased the CD at full price from Amazon.com. It's a little rigid, making sure I audition tracks before I buy. When I don't find anything this way, I tend to end up buying a lot more jazz CDs...

The CD in this case is Ujumbe, by Samba Mapalanga & Orchestra Virunga. For me the act's musical style is a familiar one, Soukous. As is my custom, I won't bother giving you in-depth details describing the style, so here's a Wikipedia article about Soukous, but Samba Mapalanga is a long-time star in the genre. The important things to know about Soukous is that the style originates in the African Congo region, frequently uses Latin rhythms as an underpinning, typically deploys at least two or three guitars (tuned to a non-Western scale), and the guitars usually play complex patterns with overlapping riffs and finger-plucking leads. Usually, they sing in French or their local tongues (typically Lingala, if I understand these things).

Ujumbe isn't a bad example of Soukous, if you're looking for one. About three quarters of the disk is electric, but the group takes an unusual turn with acoustic guitars now and then--and just to make sure things are different, they also use a nice touch of horns, complete with the occasional saxophone solo. This gives the disk a broader variety of sounds and textures than most of my Soukous disks, and that's a nice touch. My very lousy ear for lyrics tells me that the lyrics are in heavily-accented French and English, plus an African tongue. This is good stuff, with fresh, bright, ringing guitars and nicely shaped melodies.

8 out of 10.

I know it's lazy.

But I want to share a video that will make you laugh--and think. I know I'm contributing to viral marketing, something I'd rather not do, but it's the holiday season and this video seems à propos:



CDs listened to today:

• stellastarr*: (eponymous)
  

I have a pet theory about sports.

Well, sports and money. I sometimes call it my Italian soccer theory. I name it because the Italian soccer style is entirely about defense and a typical kind of game can end with a 1-0 score. Soccer wasn't always that way and there was a time when the NBA averaged 230 points per game--it's more like 190 points a night now. What happened?

Money happened. First, the players get high-priced, then the coaches get high-priced. Once the coaches are paid huge sums, they get a need to control the game. Here's the problem for semi-improvised games like soccer and basketball: they require creativity. Coaches can't control creativity, but they can destroy it with defense. Not only is defense more reliable for the coaches, it doesn't really slump. How can a coach, eager to keep such a high-paying job, resist selecting players who are better defenders than attackers? For crying out loud, the Italian soccer style is called "catennaccio"! It's Italian for "bolt the door"!

With both the NBA and the soccer authorities, they've been reluctant to modify the game to increase scoring. Soccer could easily increase scoring, just enlarge the goal but the sport's authorities are as conservative as Ronald Reagan's undies. The NBA is probably more difficult--I'm not sure what they can do. Maybe ban defense? It's interesting to compare these leagues with the NFL, which has constantly tinkered with the rules to keep scoring.

At least the soccer games still have an abstract beauty. The NBA doesn't even have that any more.

Last thoughts about Vancouver.

Of course, I primarily went to Vancouver to get to know a friend better, but it's worth acknowledging some of the subtext that the trip could only naturally acquire. He also introduced me to A; Vancouver is her hometown. As I mentioned to my friend and his wife, it's a little odd to have spent all that time with A imagining my first visit to Vancouver, always believing it would be with her--to meet her family and friends, including those whom I did meet on this visit. So I visit without her and it's only natural to think of her once or twice, given the history.

And what was I thinking about her? Thinking that this was the town where she grew up and that this place molded her. Wondering a bit about which part of town it was. A little sad that things didn't work out between us, given the time and effort involved, I suppose. Feeling a little sorry for her at how big a mess I walked out on. Other, less positive things, but it's hardly fair to give light to things that I never even brought up with her. And the fact that she remains oblivious to those matters is my failing.

CDs listened to today:

• Elvis Costello: Brutal Youth
• My Morning Jacket: Z
• Elliott Carter: The String Quartets, disk 1
• The Future Sound Of London: Dead Cities
• Jesus Guridi: Sinfonia Pirenaica
• Ingram Marshall: Hymnodic Delays
• George Gershwin: Rhapsody In Blue
• J. J. Johnson & Al Cohn: The Birdlanders

Back at home tonight.

I finished up my visit to Vancouver today, returning in the late evening. I explored Vancouver itself today, wandering around the town in the rain (safely hidden from the elements in my rental car, for the most part). I've grown accustomed to thinking of Western US cities as having newish suburbs, unlike the Eastern cities with suburbs that are much older than any town in the West. Vancouver disproves that, being roughly 180 years old. I'm a lazy thinker in not realizing this (the West Coast cities are much, much older than the Mountain West), but at least I'm attentive enough to notice!

However, outside of an older downtown and an historic park (complete with a re-created fort), Vancouver is very much like the older suburbs in the Mountain West towns. The homes are primarily modest wood-frame buildings--in fact, I didn't see any "McMansion" homes until today. I imagine I may have missed some wealthier neighborhoods in my wanderings, but the town seems nicely free from that sort of suburban "backfill" development we see in the Denver area. As time goes by, the huge houses that fill empty areas in the suburbs and urban centers disturb me more and more as eyesores and enemies of sensible urban design.

Outside of the residential neighborhoods, Vancouver has a large port facility on the Columbia river--complete with a big railroad terminal--and a downtown that looks like it has seen better days. The neighborhoods belie this bit of decay with large retail "power centers" anchored by busy discount stores and plenty of smaller retailers. As much of an urbanist as I feel I am, a town like Vancouver makes me think that maybe the downtown isn't needed. On the other hand, I'd need to see a thriving cultural scene before I withdraw my view that suburbs are for raising kids safely and economically, but cities are for living and vitality.

My friend's home, which I visited several times, is a really good example of how suburban living is good for the kids. His home is on a cul-de-sac, the dreaded bane of urbanists everywhere, where it appears to be the smallest home on the block. That's always ideal for property values, since the other, more expensive homes tend to push up your home's value. Even better, his house backs up to a spacious public park, which has gotta be the best situation I've ever seen. It's a great place for him and his family, even if it can seem a bit small with two energetic kids and a few pets running around. I envy that!

CDs listened to today:

• William Schuman: Symphony No. 9
• Bill Frisell Quartet: (eponymous)
• William Schuman: Symphony No. 10
• Ludwig van Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 5
• Aphex Twin: Richard D. James Album
• Remy Shand: The Way I Feel
• Alban Berg: Lulu Suite
• Ingram Marshall: Hymnodic Delays
• Robert Russell Bennett: Symphonic Songs for Band
  

My last full day in Portland.

I got a decent start today, rather than taking the tourist approach of leaving the hotel at 11 AM. The weather was a controlling factor again today when it came to my activity decisions. While it was warmer, it was also considerably more rainy today--with low clouds and fog, to boot. Since I was planning on seeing some of the local natural wonders, the weather made choosing easy: the coast areas were reporting gale-force winds and the low clouds made Mt. St. Helens an unlikely sight. That meant it was time to go inland and see what I could in the Columbia River Gorge (by rule, as a Coloradan, i'm allowed to bag outdoor activities when it rains--we just wait a day for the dry weather...).

The low clouds and the fog didn't make the Gorge ideal, but I headed upriver in the South bank and found a nice spot to pull off and view one of the celebrated waterfalls in the Gorge. There was a paved path, so I started following it as it started zigzagging up the hill. The signs said I covered a total of six miles, although I wonder if I misunderstood the trail markings; it felt like considerably less. Of course, being from Colorado, I refuse to call my journey a hike, that would require an unpaved path...

I learned something important while I walked up that hill: my mountaineering rain shell is old and no longer leaks--its waterproofing has completely worn out. The rain began to soak through during the last third of my stroll, leaving me a bit chilled. When I returned to the rental car, I began to warm up, but it was only the briefest drive from the trailhead to the famous Multnomah Falls and I was a bit reluctant to make the 500-meter walk to the upper viewing spot.

I took a look at the lodge at the falls and found they had a nicer restaurant with a lunch menu running about $15 for an entree. Well, that seemed fine, given my chill, but when I went inside, it turned out the were serving Sunday brunch for $23. That seemed fine to me--especially when there's unlimited bacon involved! When she asked where I wanted to sit, I asked the hostess for guidance and she commented that I looked pretty cold and wet, so she seated me by the roaring fire. Eminently civilized! The experience reminded me of Aspen a bit, where you can enjoy real outdoors and still step right into a nice place without changing clothes.

I drove quite a way after braving the cold and wet to see Multnomah Falls, the idea being that I would return to Vancouver on the North bank of the river. Turns out there aren't a lot of bridges over the river out there and that was a long drive. I made the right decision, I could see a lot more scenery from that side.

I topped off a great day with another evening with friends--I treated them to pizza. I just want to be a good guest and show my appreciation for the hospitality!

CDs listened to today:

• Esa-Pekka Salonen: L.A. Variations
• Peter Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 4
• Various Artists: Living In Oblivion, Volume 2: The 80s Greatest Hits
• Matias Aguayo: Are You Really Lost
• Kai Winding & J.J. Johnson: The Great Kai & J.J.
• Remy Shand: The Way I Feel

More fun in Portland today.

I found it pretty amusing today, watching the locals react to some minor snow flurries. I was having lunch when the predicted snow picked up--everybody in sight of the window was staring, wide-eyed, at the snow. Plus, it seemed like every time I said I was from Denver, the locals would say that I brought the snow with me (I imagine Portlanders hear the same thing about rain when they go to Denver). I don't normally consider it real snow unless it actually sticks to the ground (it didn't today), but I suppose the locals deserve credit for the rarity of this weather event.

With the weather being so awful, I figured this wasn't the right time to go see the Columbia Gorge or Mt. St. Helens, so I visited the city's best music store, shopped a few other places, and got to make my first visit to an Ikea store. I would have felt more like a good consumer if I had found some good Christmas gifts, but no such luck.

I had dinner at a friend's, where I also finally got to meet another one of those great people I've never met in person! We played a little more with the kids on the Wii, he has a couple of great kids--but the other friend's family was ill and couldn't join us (he wasn't doing so well himself). I even got to bond a bit with my host's wife, having a heart-to-heart; she's as great as her kids!

CDs listened to today:

• H. Owen Reed: La Fiesta Mexicana (Howard Dunn conducting)
• Horace Silver: The Best Of Horace Silver
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain
• Joseph Schwantner: Concerto for Percussion and Orchestra
• Thicke: A Beautiful World