The summer from hell continues. Baked in the daytime, fucking monsoons at night. Been this way since June. At least last year we only had 2 90 degree days and 10 Monsoon nights. This year I think we have 20 90 degree days and 40 monsoon nights. If I wanted this shitty weather I would have moved to the fucking tropics.
For those who have the misfortune of MSN, I couldn't do no postings anywhere due to network problems, which was still there after I got home from Dubuque. It's pretty bad when you pay 20 bucks just for a slow dialup and you can't do twitter or Facebook due MSN problems. Or being Binged, which is when MSN decides to promote their shitty search engine when your trying to see whose following you on Twitter or you get the damned MSN can't open the site messages, or they switched you to the worthless Bing, which didn't work at all last night. I finally had to deal with some dude from India which I couldn't translate what he was saying and vice versa but the dude did managed to walk me through the steps before being disconnected on the phone. I think the Taliban had something to do with that but finally I managed to get online and managed to surf the web till we got yet another monsoon storm at midnight, turning our driveway into Lake Crabb once again. And of course the weather forecast calls for more of the same this week, hot and steamy in the daytime and then at night getting heavy rains and thunderstorms. I'm sick of this weather. Can't wait for fall to which we will get some decent weather for about a week before the blizzards hit in October. And then I can bitch about the snows instead of the floods.
For Sunday, Moondog Music remains open till 9 which is a rarity and if I would have known that I would have gone to Borders first then Moondog. But CD's For Change isn't open on Sunday. But Goodwill up there is open till 8 but then again they seldom have much for music. The Northern Goodwill Stores in that area are open later unlike the Eastern Iowa Goodwill but they never have much and besides I had to deal with a couple of beaners who planned going to the bathroom at the same time as me. Or the goofball at Target who better thank his lucky stars that I didn't get Montezuma's Revenge that day. However, I did managed to find a decent Mexican place in downtown Dubuque called Salsa's and may have come across the best Pollo En Mole ever made.
I'm trying to lose some weight and walking in 90 degree weather with a blazing sun can do that but then again what I lost for weight was gained back with a generous amount of Chicken Mole. But I did a big walk down to the Mississippi and back, I think it was a 6 mile walk. But in the process got stuck hearing some Jimmy Buffet wannabe who did the lamest version of John Mellencamp I ever heard and picked up the speed back to the car just to avoid anymore of that. At least the dude is playing live but playing lame too.
This month for the first time in 41 years Robert Christgau didn't do Consumer Guide Report and the reason was that MSN decided to pull the plug on that column. Which is a shame for the fact is that everything I knew about music came from reviews from Christgau when Creem Magazine was running it and that was back in the late 70s. It was the Consumer Guide that I would read from The Village Voice after Creem went bellyup and continue to follow when Village Voice discontinued it and MSN picked it up for 3 and half years. Times have changed and the MSN format sucked most of the time as they did a one album at a time showing. Later years Robert reviewed more world music and rap acts and pop stars that didn't mean a thing for me so CG became a glanceover. It took me a month later to realize that the CG was over. I'd say about 68 percent of the time Christgau may have been right in the reviews, and some of the reviews he tended to talk down upon us or use words that I'd never use for reviews but in the meantime if I want to look up an album, I'd consult the Christgau's Consumer Guide books that I brought or I'd look it online at his site. The times are changing and even though he was still around, I think the general public with their short attention spans moved on. The Consumer Guide will be missed but like everything associated with music the last ten years (Tower Records, Warehouse Music, music stores around here) and things that killed it (The internet, Telecomm Act of 1996, MTV's shitty reality garbage) is now part of the past. RIP CG.
Due to the weather last night, the R.Smith Show had to be postponed due to servere storms in the area. Sorry folks but Mother Nature's been a bitch all summer. Saturday night, we have a power outage that knocked my computer out for 45 minutes and by the time I got back to the Saturday Night Chat, everybody took off. Guess I didn't miss much.
Finally looks like Robert Plant is tired of the heaviness that was once Led Zeppelin which explains why he has been lukewarm to any reunion talk. Perhaps it's time to finally retire Led Zeppelin, now that Plant has revived The Band Of Joy, Jason Bonham hanging with supergroup Black Country Communion (with hot shot guitarist Joe Bossamussa, Glenn Hughes and Derek Shulman) and John Paul Jones hanging with Those Crooked Vultures (Josh Homme and Dave Grohl who I might add, did a funny apperance on a Saturday Night Live repeat that I didn't see the first time). The 70s are now three decades behind and as much as we would like to, can't go back to those times. This generation needs to find thieir own heroes although with portible cell phones and Blackberries and very crappy new music (Katy Perry or Justin Bieber?) and a clueless major label mentality that won't be happening anytime soon. Good for Arcade Fire or Hold Steady but I just can't get into their music. And with everything digipacks, I'm getting less and less interested.
And so it goes. Been a slow month, especially when all i get in the comment sections is annoymous fools touting Viagra or Male Enhancement Drugs. That's why I scan them before approving anything. The Thoughts of R Smith isn't a billboard for limp dick syndrome. Too much Viagra will make you go blind ya kno?
No comments:
Post a Comment