2018 ReleasesI listen to a lot of music that comes out, but not a lot of it sticks. I've attempted to get excited about the pop and hip hop music that's being released. And I can appreciate it. But I have become a middle aged person and my taste is far too shaped by what … Continue reading Favorite Records of 2018
Category: Etudes
Linda and I have named quite a few things, from cafés to people. Linda named Kavarna after having seen a picture of a coffeehouse in Prague. Kavarna is, simply, the word for coffeehouse in Czech; we must seem pretty simplistic to native Czech speakers! It would be like traveling to the Ukraine and finding a … Continue reading On Giving Things Names, Branding, and the Like
Drinking hot liquids is a skill, which might be obvious to a rehabilitation therapist, but it wasn't to me. Not until one evening thirty years ago when my Aunt Lori made tea for me, herself, and her son. Lori and I began drinking the tea immediately, aerating it as we sipped. Her son Justin just … Continue reading Etude: Skills
Automatic for the People was never my favorite R.E.M. album. Later, the inescapable ubiquity of "Man on the Moon," and "Everybody Hurts" on radio tarnished the thing for me. Between the movie tie-in and the overly joyful "Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight," it began to feel trite and commercially exposed. At least in comparison to the music I was … Continue reading Etude (Record Review): R.E.M., Automatic for the People
