Yeah, I know, I haven’t been posting much, and I’m behind on my reasons to be cheerful,* which I had hoped to do weekly. Didn’t have that many as of Friday, though; it was a tough week at work and an unproductive week at home. My head is better overall—a lot better, really—but my energy level is so low that I can’t seem to do anything. I actually nodded off at work this morning, though fortunately it was right after I got here (at 7 friggin’ AM), so I don’t think anyone noticed.
Anyway…it was a pretty great Valentine’s Day nonetheless, and I can scrape up a few RTBC.
- Bill, after swearing up and down that he wasn’t getting me flowers for Valentine’s Day, sent me a bouquet of 40(!) gorgeous little roses (they’re not the miniature kind, but they’re not full-sized either) in various colors. They’re from the competition (even though I told him that I’d give him my employee discount code if he wanted to buy from my company), but they’re still pretty spectacular, and they were a big surprise. Not quite as much of a surprise as my other gift from him, though. We’re both huge fans of the brilliant (and possibly canceled) HBO show “The Wire,” which ranks among the best things I’ve ever seen on TV, and we both have a soft spot for the character of Omar, who robs drug dealers for a living and carries a sawed-off shotgun that he’s never shy about using, but also has a strong moral code of his own; for example, he never robs or shoots “civilians,” and he doesn’t swear. You can tell that the show’s creator, David Simon (who also created “Homicide,” another brilliant and long since canceled show), has a soft spot for Omar too; otherwise, he wouldn’t have made him such a compelling character (though I guess Omar is based partly on a couple of real Baltimore criminals whom Simon has encountered). And Michael K. Williams, a young actor who hasn’t done much else other than some guest appearances on various TV shows and some off-Broadway theater, does an extraordinary job bringing Omar to life.
Anyway, the Baltimore alt weekly, City Paper, did a story on the show and its future recently, and Bill liked the illustration that went with it, which was a sort of free-form study of Omar, showing him with his trademark shotgun, money sticking out of his jacket pocket, and a TV remote in his hand. So—here’s the amazing part—Bill contacted the paper, who forwarded his e-mail to the artist, and he arranged to buy the original artwork. Then he hand-framed it for me. “Speechless” doesn’t even begin to describe my reaction (though I’m embarrassed to say that I didn’t recognize the illustration right away); I’ve never received a more creative gift or one that had so much thought put into it. “Stunned” would be closer to the mark. I Am a Lucky Girl.
That alone would be enough for this week’s RTBC, but I’ve got some others.
- We had our Valentine’s Day dinner on Saturday night, since I knew I’d be studying on the actual night, and going out on Monday nights isn’t very appealing anyway, and decided to try out a newish Japanese place that’s closer to our house than the excellent place that we usually visit for our periodic sushi indulgences. (Whenever we eat sushi lately, we keep having people in the restaurants marvel at our capacity for it—but when you only eat it a few times a year, it’s hard not to splurge.) It wasn’t as good as our usual place, or even as good as the place way far away from our house that we went to with friends a while back, but it was quite good nonetheless, and the atmosphere of the place was a lot of fun. We sat at the sushi bar and listened to the head sushi chef bantering with the regulars. It was also cheaper than our usual place, so I have a feeling we’ll go back. I have mixed feelings about eating fish, since I’d prefer to be a real vegetarian, and I go back and forth about whether I eat it or not (currently I don’t), but somehow I’ve always been able to make an exception/justification for sushi. Actually, “justification” isn’t the right word, because I can’t think of any reason that it’s acceptable under my moral standards to eat fish—hell, I don’t even wear leather. I’m just powerless to resist the occasional urge for sushi.
- I got my proposal for the term paper for my advanced cataloging class done in time, and I think it even sort of made sense; more important, I think I’ve actually got a handle on the topic, which I was having trouble pinning down. It’s going to be (nonlibrarians may take a brief nap now) a look at how Dublin Core metadata might either replace or supplement MARC21 in the library catalog—not only for cataloging digital resources, but also for plain old bibliographic cataloging. I came to cataloging bass-ackwards, after a metadata class that was hands down the best class I’ve ever taken in any phase of my education, and I was smitten with Dublin Core and deeply suspicious of and baffled by MARC when I took the intro cataloging class. Now I’m more aware of the limitations of Dublin Core (though I still love it for its ease of use and its “flexibility and extensibility,” to use those tired buzzwords) and more aware of the advantages of MARC…though I’m ambivalent about MARC; on the one hand, the linguist part of me is drawn to the idea of librarians having their own secret, arcane language, especially now that I’ve learned to speak it on a basic level, but on the other hand, I think that arcane aspect of it is what’s going to doom it to some extent in this digital age. Anyway, the proposal is done, and the paper doesn’t seem insurmountable. (On the down side, I’m behind in the reading for my IA class and I’ve done absolutely nothing on my independent study project, but hey, this post is supposed to be upbeat and positive.)
- My copy of “Dap-Dippin’…with Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings” finally showed up yesterday. It took forever to get here—I get tired of buying stuff from Amazon, and my favorite online retailer didn’t have it, but I don’t think I’ll be buying again from the legendary indie retailer from which I ended up purchasing it any time soon—but it got here, and I’m listening to it now and it’s just knocking me flat. I love the retro packaging, and more important, I love the way Ms. Jones and band manage to make their vintage soul influences clear without sounding self-consciously retro. The lyrics, production, and overall style are thoroughly up-to-date…though if you close your eyes and pretend you’re not listening on a computer, you can sort of imagine you’re listening to a late 1960s/early 1970s Detroit soul record. Killer stuff, and I’m kicking myself now for not driving to Lawrence on Friday night to see her.
- Without going into any details that might get me in trouble, I’ll just say that I’m finally going to get a legitimate chance to work on something at work that will make actual use of the skills I’ve been spending the last couple of years (and thousands of dollars in student loans) acquiring. I’m not sure where to start with it—details will become clearer next week—but I’m as excited about it as I’ve been about anything job-related since I left the Wonderful World of Children’s Publishing.
OK, I think that’s enough for this week. I’ve got a bunch of assignments due this week, so it may not be much of a week for blogging, but I still have a post brewing in my head about traditional Celtic and British Isles music (I’m thinking of making a comp called “A Decade or So of Celtic Music That Doesn’t Suck,” but I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t get any takers for that one.), and maybe I’ll manage that on Thursday or so.
*In case anyone is curious about where the phrase “Reasons to Be Cheerful” comes from or why it will always be “part 3,” it’s from a very wonderful song by the late great Ian Dury. The closest approximation I could find to what I think the real lyrics are is here; unfortunately, it’s a site with popups, but the usual big lyric aggregator sites got the first line wrong, so I didn’t bother with them after that.
Hey, for the second week in a row you’ve pretty much sold me on a CD that’s I’ve noticed and been curious
about (Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings) … I noticed the best Indy indie store was featuring it on
one of its listening stations during my last visit but only had a minute to sample it. I also caught
a radio promo on KJHK for the show you refer to after arriving in KC for my usual all-too-brief visit home, but there was
no way I could make that.
Congrats on you on receiving such a creative Valentine’s Day gift (myself, I probably hit an).
all-time low in my own creativity this past weekend, so grudging kudos to Bill, too
I owe the Sharon Jones recommendation to a guy on Postcard, but I didn’t actually hear her until Mr. Wendland played her on his show, so I figure that’s another $15 he owes me for forcing me to buy records I might not otherwise have bought.
Sounds like I may have to pass the reimbursement on to you, though.
It’s a terrific record, retro but not overly so (as I said), and I put it on my iPod immediately. Sean (the Postcard guy) tells me I need to pick up her latest one, “Naturally,” too, though it’s apparently not quite as good. It will be my next purchase, I think…though I’m sort of taken with P2 faves I See Hawks in L.A., too, and may have to buy their disc next. But I’ll go so far as to give you a money-back guarantee on “Dap-Dippin’,” Jack–it’s that good.
Hey, I’d be a taker for “A Decade or So of Celtic Music That Doesn’t Suck!” I’m also extremely happy for you that work may finally be at least somewhat satisfying and challenging. And cheers for Bill from me, too.
Tom (who really, really likes two of the CDs on your giveaway list — Diana Darby and Greg Garing — but is hard pressed to think of someone to give them to who would like them, so I’m holding off for now.)
Tom, I’m adding the Celtic comp to the list of discs that I’m sending you at some indeterminate point, possibly in a parallel universe. (BTW, I’m also going to be buying the Delgados’ next single featuring their sure-to-be-brilliant cover of Ewan MacColl’s “Ballad of Accounting” the very minute it comes out, along with a live CD that they’re selling on their site and a couple of iTunes-exclusive EPs, so we’ll add a big long Delgados comp to that list too…)