Clip of the week (courtesy of Alex).

poor sheep!

The 21st Century Rocks!

Seriously, how can you not be grateful to be alive during this era? I mean, there is so much at your fingertips. I stayed at home last night and got to be thrilled as the Bulls outlasted the Heat in Miami, then walked upstairs and downloaded three albums off of emusic.com (another awesome website). How great is that? You can buy and sell concert tickets while at work, transfer money between bank accounts, trade stocks, heck even order groceries. My dad makes a living selling things on the internet (shameless plug: www.genesbooks.com). I’m sure I could survive for a month fairly happily without leaving my house. And then, when I do, I get to bring 4,000 songs and the ability to communicate with everyone I know with me.

I was watching frontline on PBS the other day (now there’s a line that gets the ladies…say that and the panties fly right off). It was a pathos inducing episode about a man with ALS and how it affected his family. Terribly sad and thought provoking (ALS is an “orphan disease” because there aren’t enough people with it to make it profitable enough for drug companies to research a cure). But, he was able to communicate and live after his entire body had abandoned him. He decided to continue living after his lungs shut down and had to be on a respirator continuously.  Amazing. Not possible even 20 years ago. Hmm. Didn’t mean for that example to be so…depressing.

Self-consciousness

It is probably a reflection of a personal neurosis, but, so far, I’ve found that having a blog is much like having a last.fm account (freaking awesome website, by the way). Ever since I joined last.fm I notice that I am much more aware of my musical selections. I’m excruciatingly aware that my musical choices have an audience. Last.fm is selecting “neighbors” and music for me. My friends can see when I listen to embarrassing guilty pleasures. Music is no longer just for myself.

Similarly, I now find myself wondering “will I blog about X, Y, Z”? If I do, will I get fired? Will K. get pissed that I told that story? It’s odd that it feels so private, yet I have no idea where these words will spread. But, then, maybe this feeling is just due to reading David Sedaris. If reading him doesn’t make you neurotically self-aware for a while, I have nothing to say to you.

We’ll see how long this lasts.

In an effort to avoid TV (and the inevitable depression that follows) I’ve decided to follow in the footsteps of friends (that’s you Ryan!) and cultural icons (Bill Simmons, for one) and start blogging. Wish me luck.