So Julie and Stella are currently in Kerbyville visiting Julie’s grandparents. I have low tolerance for spending vacation days traveling to the middle of nowhere to sit around and do nothing, so I stayed at home.

I’m really enjoying the sleep. I just go to sleep at night, and it’s this satisfying solid sleep. I wake up feeling like I’ve been hibernating. So good.

So last night, I was painting the front door and listening to the 2008 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductions on TV.

The front door will be orange. I picked out the color myself. It matches the blue, so it’s not like I picked out a really ugly color, but I worry it might be too bright. Of course, bright was the point. I don’t know. We’ll see. We’re going to water down some black paint and get it into the cracks of the scrollwork to give it an aged look, so that should dim the wattage a bit. On the upside, you can now actually see the scrollwork from the street.

Did anyone else see Iggy Pop performed Madonna’s songs? That was really strange. Talk about covers that sound nothing like the original.

Damien Rice sang Hallelujah when they inducted Leonard Cohen. It was nice, but you could tell everyone there was thinking about Jeff Buckley’s version. Even Damien was channeling it. I really don’t know of a more beautiful song than Jeff Buckley singing it.
I think this might be Leonard Cohen’s acceptance speech. Which is a poem and perhaps the best speech I have ever heard.:

It speaks so eloquently about why we create art and the meaning of it. Beautiful.

So, I was listening to “The Luxury Gap” by Heaven 17 again today. I got it for Christmas. I got introduced to the band with their song “Temptation” which was the club music in Trainspotting. Upon hearing it, I just couldn’t help wondering how this band wasn’t bigger.

Then I got “The Luxury Gap” and it all became clear. The entire album is essentially about the pitfalls of Thatcherism and commercialism. There’s a song about mindlessly slaving away. A song about the dangers of easy credit. A song about trophy wives. The first track on the album is “Crushed by the Wheels of Industry”. Which screams to me “happy-go-lucky dance song”.

I love it. I can see how most people wouldn’t. And I have no clue how they played this in clubs in the eighties. I know people don’t listen to lyrics, but still…

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Comments

Kate (http://katiekatworld.blogspot.com)

2008-05-09T03:14:30.000Z

I keep meaning to comment on this—do you remember Chumbawumba? They had an awesome dancy song called “Scapegoat.” You know, because you can still dance even if you’re an anarchist.

Yesterday I was reading my rss feeds. I monitor craigslist austin for the term “mid-century modern"". A post came up for two herman-miller-esque shell chairs for $35/each. They were in great shape so I decided to try to get in contact with the seller even though Julie was still asleep. I got a call from the seller and woke Julie up, showered, and piled everyone in the car.

We ended up at a very nice apartment complex in north austin. Sandwiched between some of the scariest complexes I’ve ever seen. Say what you will about where I live. There are no apartment complexes with razor-wire. Yeah. Razor-wire. Julie, saw a drug deal as we were buying the chairs. In any case we got the chairs for the price and got them in the car. I still can’t quite believe it. I’m never one of the people who find vintage pieces for amazing prices.

Since we were up North we decied to go check out Eubank Acres. Elle who owns Austin Modern came to our oscar party. And complimented our house. She then talked about where she lived as being similar. Eubank Acres is bounded by Braker on the South, Lamar on the West and I-35 on the East. It looks a lot like our neighborhood although with fewer traditional houses. Lots of amazing houses with amazing windows. They also have lots of hills and creeks. Very nice place. And the fact you can get a house for under $200k should make it a really nice alternative to the Shoal Creek area. We drooled and drooled.

View Larger Map
Anyway, here’s a picture of our craigslist steal:

Just read this CNN article on people’s reactions to rising gas prices. It’s fascinating to see that people are starting to get it. It’s starting to hit home. They do these fairly frequently and in the past they’ve had a lot of mixed opinions. This is the first one that has been overwhelmingly negative.

Personally, we’re getting hit by the rising food prices a lot more than gas. We had our first $30 tank of gas recently, but that’s not really that big of a deal. We use about 2-3 tanks of gas a month. So $15-20 isn’t gonna break us. But we did fuel up my parent’s truck last week as part of moving in our set for The Automat, and it was $50. I don’t know how people who commute can afford 4 tanks of gas a month at $50 a pop. You really start to see how moving to the city can become affordable. If you have two sub-20mpg vehicles and two commutes that require filling up a gas tank weekly, you could afford about $40,000 more house for the price of your commute. That’s nuts.

In the past a lot of artists have drawn images of what they imagine suburbia will look like during a nuclear winter. I wonder if we’ll see that in an “oil winter”?

What do you think? Do you think it’s time to sell your house for one on a bus route, and dump your sub-20mpg cars, or do you think this too will pass?

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Comments

Julie (www.juliesdramas.blogspot.com)

2008-02-29T21:52:06.000Z

It’s going to get worse before it gets better. I am actually encouraged by some of the actions people are taking in this article. You don’t need that giant SUV to commute to work in the city. People should live closer to their jobs. These are good changes and hopefully the car companies will listen to us and make more fuel-efficient vehicles. I’m hitting a lot of frustration because we want our next car to have a 3rd row of seats and fuel-efficiency is basically non-existant in that class of vehicles. Minivans get 17 or 18 mpg city! So we’ll probably save up for an SUV(!) of all things, the Toyota Highlander Hybrid, because it gets 27 city and 25 highway (due to the way hybrids work its city mileage is better). Or else we’ll just shove our kids into a tiny car and make people who come visit us drive too.

Kate (http://katiekatworld.blogspot.com)

2008-03-01T04:59:47.000Z

I’ve heard people saying that they’re rethinking their big cars. We also had some friends move out of their giant suburban home into a smaller city home. No more commuting, gas, tolls. They said that all added up. And who really needs a 5,000 ft2 house? I mean, other than the family with the 16 kids on TLC. I am thinking about a car that I could fit two carseats into. I am determined to wrestle ONE in and out of my Beetle, if only because I am ornery and contrary. And also, it’s Ryan’s turn for a new car (another wagon) and we don’t want two car payments. Have I sent you the link to that cars for parents blog? Most of it isn’t useful but sometimes they have a good review of a non-SUV that’s good for multiple kids. I don’t know what to say about carting non-children type people in addition. Oh! And I was at the gas station recently and my $40 hurt until the woman in the giant Suburban said, “That was just $90!” Um, wow. How can you afford that?!? And the car payment isn’t small, either. I realize that this was in an enclave, but still. She commented on it.

Kate (http://katiekatworld.blogspot.com)

2008-03-01T05:01:13.000Z

P.S. And what about sedans? Not a Taurus, okay. ;)

Tim (http://www.loadedguntheory.com/blog/director/listblog/tim.html)

2008-03-01T17:16:48.000Z

I hope the Beetle works better than the Golf. I had to actually get into the car to get Stella in and out. And we’re only considering vehicles with 3 rows of seats. The Scion will work great for up to two kids.

Kate (http://katiekatworld.blogspot.com)

2008-03-02T04:50:25.000Z

Yeah, I’m afraid that my experience will be a lot like yours. I was reading about it before and shuddering. Ryan asked what people in Europe do. Seriously. Ryan saw a VW minivan from Mexico here. Are there any (dreaded) minivans that get decent gas mileage? I don’t have much useful to say other than this bites. You want/have to put your kids in the safety seats and yet you don’t want to drive an armored vehicle. I wish it wasn’t so hard.

Tim (http://www.loadedguntheory.com/blog/director/listblog/tim.html)

2008-03-02T15:42:01.000Z

“Are there any (dreaded) minivans that get decent gas mileage?” Not yet.

M1EK (http://mdahmus.monkeysystems.com/blog/)

2008-03-03T16:29:00.000Z

Toyota sells a hybrid minivan in Japan, which they won’t bring over here because it’s smaller than their Sienna model. Supposedly some marketing geniuses told them back when it came out that you can’t ever move DOWN in size on a car model - they ignored the possibility of bringing it over and calling it something else (as in the Yaris sneaking in under the Corolla).

So today I got hungry. And I decide to make popcorn.

We had some unpopped pop corn in the pantry from our Oscar party. And I had read on Treehugger how you can make microwave popcorn with the normal stuff. You don’t need to buy the bags. And you really shouldn’t buy the bags, since they can kill you. And not just in laboratory rats. Real-life microwave popcorn eaters have gotten cancer from cooking the fake butter. But I digress.

You’re supposed to put the corn in a brown paper lunch bag. But that doesn’t seem very treehugger-y.

First, I tried a paper boat. Which I realize is also disposable and negates my argument above. But I didn’t have any brown paper lunch bags, so the environmental reasoning came later. It’s one of those boats that they served French Fries in at your school cafeteria. We got about 100 of them when we purchased our house. I don’t know why the previous owners needed so many paper boats (and obviously they didn’t either since they left them). But I like to imagine the previous owner sitting down to lunch every day for a steaming paper boat full of Frito pie. Mmmm… sounds good.

So, I put them in the boat. This resulted in some really cool visuals and a bit of popping, but not enough. I cleaned out the microwave. Put the popped popcorn in a bowl and put the unpopped kernels in another bowl. Then I put a third bowl on top of the unpopped kernels and threw that back into the microwave. This time the popping was more contained, although not as entertaining. Ok, it was still pretty entertaining. I like watching the top bowl, slowly separate from the bottom as the popcorn inside gets bigger and bigger. What can I say, I wasn’t allowed to watch much TV as a kid.

This worked pretty well. Still too many unpopped kernels, but a lot more popcorn. The only problem is that it kind of fuses to the bowls. So, I’ll have to work on that. At this point I had enough popcorn to eat, but I’ll return to my experimentation at a later date.

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Comments

kelli

2008-02-29T21:48:07.000Z

I’m assuming this was more for scientific experimentation than actual hungriness? Because you can make it on the stove too. :) And hey, I keep meaning to ask, you posted awhile back about Walmart coming out with canvas bags for shopping. I have had zero luck with actually using them. The cashiers are mean about them. Have you had this happen? Or do you not ever go to Walmart?

Kate (http://katiekatworld.blogspot.com)

2008-03-01T05:07:42.000Z

I have tons of paper bags if you need some. They’re great for teenage-contraband. I put their name on the outside, wrap it up, and they’re reasonably mollified and not completely convinced that I am going to risk my job and my license to steal their Sidekick. But I digress. That “butter” is scary. Plus, it only tastes good when it’s the 8 zillion calorie stuff and then you might as well just get out the real butter. I’ve only ever used my bags at Central Market, although I’m planning to use them more and at Kroger. CM always asks if they’re new, but other than that, I don’t get flak. And IKEA, of course. Maybe the crabby people are just not used to them yet. I also love how the handles are so great—you can put them over your shoulder. And they hold so much more! Out kitchen is on the second floor, so this is a significant benefit for us.

Tara (http://rabid-fraggle.blogspot.com/)

2008-03-02T06:10:12.000Z

I’ve never had anyone ask if they were new before, even when I use the CM bags at CM… but maybe it’s the hodgepodge collection that I’ve got, or the fact that I had to dig them out from under other junk to get them out. I have had lots of frustrations at stores (including CM, but mostly at HEB) when I try to get someone to use a bag I provided, or to not use a bag at all. Doesn’t it just get your goat when you purchase one reasonably sized thing, and they start to put it in a bag. Then when you tell them that you don’t need a bag, I mean you do have these funny grippy things on the end of your arms, they take the bag they were going to give you, rip it off the stack and plop it in the trash. I mean, if you’re going to put it in the trash, by all means give me the damn bag. I can recycle it, or reuse it or something.

American Gods is available online for free. This was part of the “books people don’t finish reading” if you remember. Here’s your chance. I loved it. One of my favorite books in recent memory.

http://browseinside.harpercollins.com/index.aspx?isbn13=9780060558123&WT.mc_id=author_AmerGods_FullAccess_022208

So I spent a bit of time arguing with a guy a while back about taxes. He felt that I “did nothing to prove to [him] that you or anyone else is entitled to the money I work my ass of[f] for.” Which is interesting. After talking to him a bit more I found out that he really just doesn’t like medicaid and welfare, which of course get a lot of people up in arms. Even if those programs are only a fairly small amount of the tax we pay yearly. But it got back to the government “taking” money from people (of course no one every complains about the military “taking” more than half the taxes you pay every year, but I digress). Which I think is a big perception problem. The government is for us. It is us. We are paying for the services we use or could potentially use. And we agree to pool our resources to get things done that we couldn’t alone. Pretty simple. But the anti-tax rhetoric is out of control.

Which brings me to the President this morning. He was jibber-jabbering about nothing much, and got a question about the economic stimulus package. Here he is explaining the purpose of the package:

And the purpose is to encourage our consumers. The purpose is to give them money — their own to begin with, by the way — but give them money to help deal with the adverse effects of the decline in housing value. Consumerism is a significant part of our GDP growth, and we want to sustain the American consumer, encourage the American consumer and, at the same time, we want to encourage investment. So we’ll see how the plan works.

First off. I love the fact that he can say “their own [money] to begin with” when referring to rebate checks paid for with debt to the Chinese. But we all know that facts are not where Bush excels.

What blows my mind is this discussion of consumers. That we have become in essence a national resource. Like lumber, minerals, or oil. And we’re apparently the only one left. That rather than deal with the underlying problems that got us here, like consumer debt, a housing bubble, and financial market corruption, we should instead spend our way to financial security! We must be fed and sustained, like the endangered animals we are. I can’t wait to have a president who can think outside the shopping mall.

On a side note, the set for the Automat looks fantastic. I want to go in and have a meal. You guys gotta check it out. Got your tickets yet? http://lgt.buyplaytix.com.

<a href=“http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/tx/austin/103160537” _fcksavedurl=“http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/tx/austin/103160537”>Run around the AMD
<a href=“http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/tx/austin” _fcksavedurl=“http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/tx/austin”>Find more Runs in Austin, Texas
I don’t have much to say about this route. I ran into a little old German lady who told me it was wonderful that young people walked. I was running. I’m chalking it up to a language barrier. I mostly ran around AMD. AMD has some really nice trails right near my house that all have prominent “Private Property” signs. Punks. I also ran into some people who lost their wiener dog. I didn’t see it unfortunately. Managed to put in less than 10 minute miles which is really good for me with all of these hills. Still not used to these hills.

You can now go buy or reserve your tickets for The Automat.

Time for more of that viral marketing. Tickets for “The Automat” are now on sale. This show is really fun and light. Plus I think that Ian and I are going over the top on building this set. It’s going to be really cool.

Here’s a button to put on your blog or other site:

And here’s the code:

[src="http://www.loadedguntheory.com/images/automatButton.gif"   
alt="buy tickets for the automat" />](http://lgt.buyplaytix.com)  

Also, we’re now on facebook:

And you can still add us on myspace: