nah pop, no style

• It’s hay fever season, which means it’s Zyrtec-D season, which means it’s “go to Rite Aid and get your Zyrtec-D at the pharmacy counter and try to swipe your driver’s license and find that it’s still too old and doesn’t swipe so then the clerk has to enter your information and make you sign the ‘this person might be making meth in his basement so keep an eye out’ sheet and then you think ’sure is a good thing my parents’ address is still on my license so they’ll be busting into THEIR basement instead of mine’” season. I just got a two-week supply, so hopefully I can wise up and make my appointment and get my new license between now and the next time I need to get some. Sarah, the ever-defeated pharmacy cashier at the Smithfield Rite Aid hopes so, and she told me so. I can’t blame her.
• Saturday was Run Around the Square; it was the first one of these I’ve done, and it was a good time, though not necessarily a good measure of one’s best 5K time (the start line was so clogged up, it took a good 10 seconds before I was even able to start running). I did 27:19, which is good but not as good as the race I did earlier this year. (It is, however, better than I thought I did; for some reason when I crossed I thought it was 28:19, but the results online say otherwise.) Also, fellow spy Eric repped at this event, his first race, and didn’t stop to walk at any point, which rules. True Spies track club!
• I might do the Steelers 5K on Monday morning. I have another day or so to decide. Maybe might as well?
• Been playing that guitar, and suffering from a toothache which will be better soon, and thinking about future plans. That’s about it.

Hi!

My Nicole Reynolds piece is up, find it here. There’s a link at the end to a lil ol’ video that I shot of her at the farm. Nothing too high-budget, just a little song.

Tonight is Cages at ModernFormations, which is where I’ll be if I’m not at home bellyachin’ about this toothache that has taken hold in my life over the past couple days. It’s my fault, I should’ve gone to the dentist earlier, I know.

Otherwise, lots of Olympic watching, still. Also, got out to play a little tennis earlier this week with a couple friends who blog. Hopefully I’ll do that again. I do like some tennis (speaking of which, Federer and both Williams sisters got booted already in Olympic play, eh? Always weird times).

From yesterday’s Post-Gazette:

Sticking with rotary

“If you are calling from a rotary phone, hang up and call back from a touch-tone phone.” This is what I was told by a woman’s voice on a machine, as if we all have the responsibility to abandon rotary phones and buy a touch-tone phone.

Our responsibility is to switch our business to a place where this heinous policy is not being practiced. It’s been 24 years since Big Brother — I think it’s all coming true.

May God help us.

EUGENE PATRICK BARRY
West View

May God help us indeed, Eugene. I remember that part in 1984 where Big Brother forced everyone to use touch-tone. And the punishment for phonecrime was not pretty at all.

The other day outside the public library, I saw a woman apparently changing the diaper of a child who looked to be much too old to have a diaper changed at all, much less in the middle of a patch of grass outside in the city with lots of people walking by. The kid wasn’t, like, 7 or 8, but he was definitely at least 3, maybe 4, I’d say. I didn’t get a REAL close look, obviously. However, I did laugh. Poor child.

Coming up? This wknd: tonight, the Pammer and I go to see the Synge Cycle stuff that Pittsburgh Irish & Classical is doing. “Riders to the Sea” and something else that I don’t know anything about. Two short-ish plays. Should be alright. I’ll be missing the first Steelers pre-season game but it’ll be boring.

Tomorrow is OLYMPICS and also the Burndowns/Brain Handle/Weird Paul show. Later on is Screaming Females on Tuesday Monday, and Oneida on Wednesday. Etc. etc.

First order of business: Burndowns article in this week’s paper now online. Go check it. I guess I did an okay job of contextualizing the band musically in this one. In my Nicole Reynolds piece I basically do very little do describe her music, I think. I guess my nature is more that of a profile writer than a music reviewer. I find writing/reading about people to be much more exciting than writing/reading about music. That’s just how it is.

Now then. Lately reading: How to Grow More Vegetables etc. etc. etc. I’ve not read up much on biointensive ag in the past, and I’m getting more and more interested in the idea of dropping out of life and starting a farm. Okay, not DROPPING OUT OF LIFE. But having a farm someday. Into it.

My weekend, you say? Well. Uhhh, I didn’t do much of anything Friday night. Then I cleaned out my kitchen cupboards and organized things and put the bulk stuff that was in flimsy bags into tupperware containers and labeled them. Ran a little, went show-hopping at the BBT (Weird Paul!) and Howler’s. Sunday, visited the parents to swap out some scrappy stuff from my garden (sod, dried dead weeds) for some finished compost.

The garden — I’m finally getting way into it, but unfortunately since I was slow to start this year, there’s not that much I can do at this point.  It’s  odd because usually I’m way stoked early in the season, and I’m burning out around now. Maybe next year I’ll get it right.

I’m planning to put in a few fall crops soon; I’ll update you on that. Otherwise, I’ve been harvesting a bit. Not a yield of Torley St. proportions, but a hot banana pepper here, a handful of grape tomatoes there, some zucchinis. I ate my entire summer bean harvest as a side dish the other night.

Musicwise: as noted, two weeks of Andy-penned music features coming. Burndowns Wednesday, Nicole Reynolds next week. Sometimes I write a 250-word piece and run out of things to say; these two were both 800ish and I ran out of room to write things. Also on the upcoming, the MANS show this Friday was cancelled, but Screaming Females play Roboto next Monday (the 11th).

Otherwise, getting pumped on the Olympics in all their cheesy, commercialized glory. OH AND STEELERS SEASON WHICH IS ABOUT TO START. I watched Sunday night football last night because I stumbled upon it, not realizing it would be on, and I was pretty pumped. Okay that’s all bye.

Alright, people. Let’s get down to it. Last week I started a draft of a post in which I discussed how freaking long it had been since I last updated this thing. Since then, it’s only been longer. Why so quiet? I dunno. Haven’t felt like posting. DO I OWE YOU AN EXPLANATION? DO YOU THINK I –

Sorry, I’ll chill. Not much new on this front. Got a guitar, playing it a lot. Working a bunch. City Guide came out last week, for what it’s worth — pick up a paper today if you haven’t gotten one, since tomorrow the new issue will be out and City Guide won’t be in it. Next week (not this) I have a big feature on Burndowns (in anticipation of their August 9 release at Gooski’s with Brain Handle and Weird Paul) and the following week, a big feature on Nicole Reynolds. I haven’t had a main music feature in a while, so it’ll be nice. It’s fun to work in a slightly longer form.

There are things I haven’t done yet this summer (play tennis). I will try to catch up with those things. It’s nearly August. Of course, rain notwithstanding, fall is a good time for tennis — not as hot — so it’ll be okay if I play tennis in the fall instead of summer.

Otherwise, kickin’ back, chooglin’, apparently taking a blogging vacation of sorts. It’s all good. What have YOU been up to?

Don’t read too much into this one, kids. Here’s hoping Mary comes back to Jeff so she can do it many more ways.

Also, on an unrelated note, I had a dream the other night that I killed a spider that was having babies and that was carrying two mini pierogies and one spool of thread. (Ironic, I suppose, that a spider would feel it necessary to carry a spool of thread . . .)

Almost time to embark upon the long weekend, which I do not really have mapped out. Don’t worry, I’ll make something happen. One thing that will definitely occur will be my attending the Torley Manor party on Saturday. Also I think Sunday I will make my parents some food.

If you haven’t yet, devote a good 15 or 20 minutes to watching Fred Durst, who now looks like he’s about 70, on Tom Green.  It’s an interesting interview, and yields such gems as:

“This is KORN, with a ‘K!’ And a backwards ‘R!’”

and

“I don’t recommend that anyone drink anything though. Except, like, Yoo-Hoos, and Sun– Sunny Delight, Sunny D . . . and, like, milk and stuff.”

Not to mention the part where he shows off his tattoo, then completely forgets and shows it off again thirty seconds later.

Last night I watched MOST of America’s Got Talent. And while I’m a fan, I have to admit to you that it’s starting to wear on me already this season. Three episodes, three of the exact same narrative arc — four or five abysmal acts, an angry crowd, THE JUDGES ARE FRUSTRATED, then comes some great, inspirational act to save the day in (insert name of city here). We’re not THAT stupid, guys. I don’t know if it’s just the way the show is edited, or the way the contestants are arranged during the actual auditions, or a combination, but it’s really contrived.

There have been a few enjoyable acts, and a minimum of hilarity from the Hoff, but on the whole, I’m not that sold on it this year, and I might not keep investing my Tuesday nights in it. My time is precious, people.

Also the part where Hasselhoff hit his buzzer while that guy had a sword halfway down his esophagus last night was terrifying. Holy hell. Get it together, Hoff.