rock star painters

someone's youtube rendition of red house painters' "have you forgotten".  the video's interesting but the song is good quality, which is why i'm posting it.  
Anyway, I was eating Wendy's in my car today while listening to this song, and I wondered why the heck they were called Red House Painters.  I figured it's because some musicians consider themselves musical artists, and if so, these guys would be red house painters....  meaning cheap ass house painters.  listening to this song, i'm pretty sure i'd hire these guys to paint my house.  they seem like good old american folks.

A side thought I had was, which americana artist would i feel most confident in their handiwork skills.  personally, i'd go with my man will oldham, as pictured.  he just looks like he came out of the ground, so he'll have no problem getting down and dirty in any household problem.  he'd have a ball cleaning the pool and fixing mili, our automatic pool cleaner that's always broken.  he'd hold down our outdoor furniture during torrential storms so they don't blow away, as they do now.  

what is americana...  americana is music rooted and grown in blue-collar soil, beaten by rain and baked under the sun.  it's pruned of insincerity yet it's harvested in bulk, in prolific harvests of song after song from some head or heart.  it's like wheat, a crop so uninteresting yet a staple in our everyday diet.  we all consume it whenever we hear a story, or when someone strums her guitar.  the presence of the sound is like the beginning of a story, and it's heard, and it fades away and then ends.  and then another strum, another song, another bushel of wheat.  and it's all happening amidst pop music, indie rock, electronica and hip hop.  americana is so obvious that it's hidden.  we all recognize a folk song within a few seconds, but it's a partitioned activity, shelved for an open-mic or cafe experience. so for those who are working the farms, tilling the fields, they're doing so with john cage-like freedom.  that it's ingestible is the surprise.
i've noticed here in california that people, especially the privileged, are really individualistic.  they rarely ask others' opinions on anything, but expect everyone to hear their own.  they champion social and environmental issues, but they don't particularly care about their neighbor.  every week, my classmates and i ask what we did the past weekend.  it's probably the most boring conversation i have that week.  i don't know why we even care to ask... and i'm not passing judgment or complaining.  i'm just noticing these stark differences between conversations here and anywhere else i lived.  and anywhere else, the utility of the conversation is in the interaction, not the information.  here, individualism is so cherished that they'd rather err on the side of indifference rather than a true acceptance of others' opinions and beliefs.... so they don't even ask about them. 
but the not so privileged, from my experience, are not bereft of hardship.  which means they're not left to find the next social cause to rally behind or to search for the next nature-y activity.  sure, they give a shit about the environment, but they lack the guarded pretense and isolationism that not-so-subtly hides behind (and um... defines) the liberal, educated, "laid-back" californian.  for me, talking to the tow truck driver was the highlight of my day.  he actually asked me if i golfed before he went off about his golfing exploits.  he wasn't embarrassed to say he broke three clubs in one frustrating day on the course... but he wasn't showing off either.  he was just him, and that quality is hidden from me when i go to class and hang out with students and professors.
this all makes sense in my head, so bear with me.  when i listen to americana, the part in me that longs to hear a meaningful story begins to resonate, and it shakes off the pretense of having to laugh at people who aren't funny or my tiresome nodding listening to some guy's weekend expedition.  the voice, the guitar, it's the opposite of indifference and falsity.  it's elemental, it's a story.  when i listen to will oldham, i hear a real person singing.  his voice breaks and cracks as if you asked your friend to sing you a song unrehearsed.  he sounds like the soil, battered by the wind and the sun.  when i listen to califone, i hear real instruments and real guitars, rattling, vibrating the air.  the air!  when do we ever consider the air through which sound travels, except when we can feel its space through the sparseness of sounds.  
the ground, the air, the elements that speak through folk songs, they level people.  it's like living in cleveland, where we all deal with the same 5 month winter.  that common experience levels the high and mighty, so hills and valleys are not so disparate.  in california, on a university campus where recycling is more important than listening, we are leveled by a common experience that americana brings.  we can hear hopeless winters in folk music.  we share the stories and experiences of a common struggle when we listen to each fading song, or strum or lyric.  

home alone

most of my posts are either about solitude or how i've befriended stuffed animals/tv show characters, or all of the above. this one is no different. i've been home alone for about a week since my parents went to hawaii. i spent all of last weekend sitting on the couch, pigging out on food and grading papers. i guess i could be doing that even with my parents at home, but it's a different level of sloth when ur half-naked and by yourself.

a more detailed recap of my weekend is as follows:

harry potter. they were playing the first 3 potters on consecutive nights, and i happen to catch all of them. (what's more pathetic is that on the second and third nights, they played the previous nights' movie(s), so by the third night i watched all 3 potters in a row). anyway, i've said this before and i'll say it again.... the third installment, the prisoner of azkaban, is by far the best harry potter movie to date. i think the first two were too expansive in plot whereas the third one was relatively simple. also, the tone is more mature and there are actual scary moments. the only bad thing about the prisoner of azkaban is that every time harry faints, the screen goes black, and that happens about 20 times in the movie. also, harry is frequently offered chocolate by professor lupin whenever he wakes up from a fainting spell (no pun intended) with no real explanation other than, "it really helps." why does it help???

bourne identity/ultimatum - i rented the bourne ultimatum on itunes and watched it one night. it was totally hyped by everyone who said it was the best bourne movie and really entertaining and all that. yeah it was okay but after i rewatched the bourne identity on tnt this weekend, i really think that's the superior movie. i know i know, bold statement, but by the third installment we already know bourne is going to kick major azz, whereas in the first movie, we don't really know what he's capable of and we're figuring it out as he does. granted, the movie falls flat after about an hour in, but that first hour sure is cool.

the cavs - they are awesome, and i can't wait to get danny gibson back to shoot them threes. there was one particular moment of awkwardness/hilarity during the bulls/cavs game after wally z hit a clutch 3 pointer. he hits the shot, then runs down court screaming in glee for the whole length of the floor. i mean, i understand an emphatic howl or something, but he just looked a little kid running to give a gift to his dad (minus the kid tripping and falling and breaking the gift.... that was the saddest moment of my life).

van helsing vs underworld vs blade - tnt had some kind of vampire movie marathon this weekend and i happened to catch all three of their highlighted movies... multiple times. i'd say i enjoyed all three equally, so it was great being able to switch from van helsing on TNTHD to underworld on regular TNT and then to blade on TNTHD after van helsing ended, back to blade 2 on regular TNT. watching two vampire movies concurrently is a great and easy way to pass 6 hours of what otherwise could have been a productive day.

i don't really remember the other shows i watched, but those will do for now. next weekend ought to be a little more eventful.... i told my friends at davis that i can afford an expensive trip to colorado for a weekend cuz i don't spend any money sitting at home every other weekend. man.... this post is really sad. oh well!

bagpipez

i've got bagpipes on the mind. no, not jeff bagwell aka jeff bagpipes. i'm talking about scottish bagpipes, particularly a set played by a little girl outside my house on nice afternoons. every once in a while i'll hear the high-pitched whine of scottish melodies in my house... and lo and behold, it'll be the same little girl in the park, standing in her scottish gear playin those pipes. at first it was a true wtf moment but i guess i'm used to it.

i notice these peculiarities about my development because, on weekends, i rarely leave the house. that's pretty amazing since there's not much to do here, but i occupy myself with tv, the wire, lost and eating. and because i am eating, i feel like i'm doing something productive (that is, getting bigger). unfortunately [getting bigger] = .1[eating]^.1. actually it's more like [g]=.1[eating]^.1[working out]^.4[somehow slowing down my metabolism]^.5. cobb douglas ftw.

econ is lame. but what if i stay here an extra year, doing econ-related things? it is a possibility. i read on my friend's blog about this mit study about how having too many options keeps us from choosing the best option or something like that. that's subtly very intuitive if you think about it in terms of cost-benefit. if you choose a really good option, you could be missing out on all those other things you could be doing, and you're actually worse off than the guy who only has two options and chooses the better one... cuz his opportunity cost was lower.

ok that is all for now. i'm going to venture out to a cool cafe... one where everyone stares at you when u walk in, silently judging you. i'll fit right in.