So, I never realized this, but when Magnolia leaves decay, they leave behind these absolutely amazing leaf skeletons. I found one sitting by my front door a couple of days ago:
I just thought this was incredible. Nature is cool.
I don’t know what the weather’s like where you live right now, but chances are it’s not anywhere near as nice there as it is here right now. (I KNOW that won’t hold true for some you…you don’t need to comment on’t. Thanks.)
Anyway, because of our unseasonably warm winter this year (i.e., we’ve had highs well into the 50’s almost every day since January 1), we are quite far along in terms of our spring bloomage. This morning, I got up at 7:30, and took Luke on a six-mile walk around Redmond, and in order to get myself used to hauling a chunk of extra weight in preparation for my backpacking trip this August, I bought along the whole of my camera gear as well. This turned out to be fortuitous, as 7:30-9:30 on a sunny March morning in Redmond is a perfect time to get macro photos of some of the stunning flowering plants around the area. To start, we open with an establishing shot of one of the streets in my neighborhood:
Pretty, right? That’s what I see pretty much everywhere I go…and believe it or not, I’d say that in terms of the springtime bloom, we’re only about 1/3 complete.
Next, we’ll do a mid-range shot. This is a Magnolia tree immediately outside my front door:
Then I got in close. I love macro photography, and decided that would be my focus for the rest of the walk.
I love springtime.
So, I’m thinking of starting a new feature here at the One Off Blog called "Places I’m Not Allowed to Go" in which I shame myself publically for having no self control over the spending of money. There are certain stores which have an almost siren-like allure to me, calling me into a whirling vortex of spending from which I can never escape. Today’s featured store? Kohl’s.
I don’t really know why, but something about Kohl’s is like crack to me. Whoever designed their retailing concept is an absolute genius. For those of you who don’t understand the joy that is Kohl’s, first I will weep for you, then I will explain. Kohl’s is like a cross between JC Penny and Target, but with better clothes and decor, much lower prices, and aerosolized crack pumped through the HVAC system. You can get clothing, shoes, home decor, kitchen, bed, and bath stuff, and small appliances. They usually have a very good selection of stuff, and reasonable prices.
The thing about Kohl’s, however, is not what they are selling, but HOW they sell it. It’s hard to go to Kohl’s and find something that’s not on sale. Usually, pretty much everything is on sale all the time. They have regular promotions using "Kohl’s Cash" where, for every $50 you spend, they give you a gift certificate for another $10. If you put your purchase on your Kohl’s card, they let you do a scratch-off thing to see if you get an additional 15%, 20%, or 30% off your entire order. You can always get coupons for something. And it’s not like they jack up their regular prices in order to offset the discounts. You can find identical or comparable items at the non-discounted price at any major retailer. I don’t know how they manage to do it, but they do.
The result of all this discount chicanery is that I am NEVER able to walk into Kohl’s with a list of specific items I need and walk out without something I didn’t need. All those 75% off signs just do me in.
Case in point: Last night, I needed to get new pillows as part of my biannual pillow replacement project due to my propensity to drool while I sleep. I wanted to get two queen pillows, and that’s it. Well, the pillows, normally priced $20 were 50% off. While I was looking at the pillows I noticed that, on the endcap behind me, there were bedspreads on sale for 80% off. I recently got a new bed and mattress pad, and my existing bedspread wasn’t big enough with the extra height to be tucked in…something that’s mandatory if you have a platform bed. So I found a bedspread for $30 after discount. Since I got a new bedspread, and I had new pillows, I needed to get new sheets as well, because my old sheets were the deep-pocket kind, so they didn’t really fit on my mattress. But that was okay, because they were 600 count sheets and were 60% off. And I also had to get matching pillow cases, which were 75% off. Then, I figured that, since they were having such a great sale on bed and bath items, that I should pick up some new towels for the guest room since the towels I have in there are like using terrycloth sandpaper. They were 50% off.
And, of course, I put the whole amount on my Kohl’s card (don’t worry, I’ll pay it all off next bill), which netted me an extra 15% off the whole order. Overall, I got about $350 worth of stuff for about $130, AND, I got $20 in Kohl’s Cash which I can use starting on Monday–which is awesome right? Except for the part where I was only supposed to go into the store to get two queen-sized pillows. And that is why Kohl’s has now been added to the list of "Places I’m Not Allowed to Go."
Coming up Next: Fry’s Electronics, Guitar Center.
Yesterday, I documented in a somewhat disjointed fashion my latest trevails in bread making. I am pleased to report that the No-Knead Bread experiment was a resounding success. Exhibit A.
The loaf is crusty and chewy on the outside, with a soft, pleasant interior and a rustic larger bubble structure, like a good artisan loaf. Despite the fact that I had to stay up until 1AM to finish the loaf because I got distracted by Assassins Creed 2 on the Xbox, it was well worth the minimal effort necessary to make this bread. In fact, I have decided that, from now on, I will no longer buy artisan bread from the store. It’s just WAY too easy to make this bread. And, for about $0.50, I was able to make bread that would cost me $5 to buy. And it was actually better.
How do you do it? You will need a very small bit of specialized hardware for this project. But fortunately for you, it is very cheap. Exhibit B.
This is a 10" unglazed terra cotta flower pot with a 12" terra cotta saucer that I got from the garden section of my local Fred Meyer. Together, the two of them cost me $11.36 cents including tax. You may even be able to find them cheaper at a certain evil company whose name rhymes with Sprawl-Mart. This will be the baking vessel. You want to make sure that you get the UNGLAZED terra cotta. And make sure you wash it thoroughly before you use it to bake, please. You could also use something like a lidded ceramic dish or cast iron Dutch oven. It’s got to be something that can absorb and hold heat and distribute it evenly. It also must be covered. More on that later.
You will also need to get a couple of non-terrycloth towels, preferably cotton. I used my pastry fabric for rolling out pie dough (best thing EVER for pie dough), but if you don’t have that, a basic tea towel will do.
Ingredients:
3 Cups of Bread Flour. (All Purpose will work, but it won’t be anywhere near as crusty and delicious)
1/4 t. Active Dry Yeast
1 1/4 t. Salt
1 5/8 C Water (Just use a 3/4 measure, and don’t quite fill it all the way to the top).
A pinch of cornmeal (to keep dough from sticking)
And that’s it. The trick is in the technique.
First, you’ll want to put all the dry ingredients together into a large bowl. Using a fork or whisk, stir them together to evenly distribute the yeast and salt. Then add the water and stir until combined. The dough will be very wet and sticky. That is by design. Put a sheet of plastic wrap down on the dough directly, and place the bowl in a standard 70 degree(ish) room. I used my laundry room, which was a little warmer because the dryer was running.
A quick food science lesson: What makes good crusty bread good is gluten. It’s a substance that’s created when the protein in the wheat flour is mixed with water. When making bread, there are two ways to encourage the formation of gluten. Traditionally, when you want to get a great, crusty bread, you knead the hell out of it. Most recipes for artisanal breads say that you should knead the dough for 30 minutes by hand or 15 minutes if you’re using a stand mixer. Then you let it rise. Punch it down and knead it again. Let it rise again, then bake it. Well, there’s another way to generate gluten in your bread dough: time. Gluten will generally form if given enough time…even if you don’t knead it at all. With bread, however, the difficulty is giving the dough enough time to generate gluten, but not so much time that the yeast can take over and turn your dough into the Blob that Ate Tokyo. That is why, for this recipe, there is such a minute amount of yeast. If you were to put in a full packet of yeast, the dough would balloon up in a couple of hours, and the yeast would have eaten through all the food in the dough before there would be enough time for the dough to develop adequate gluten. With such a small amount of yeast, the dough rises very slowly, allowing the dough time to get all gluteny. And no, gluteny is not a word.
The dough for this recipe must sit for 12-18 hours…18 being preferable. I had originally planned on letting mine rest for 12 hours, but because I forgot, it got a 14 hour rest. During that time, you’ll find that the bread will also develop the kind of flavor that most non-sourdough breads simply can’t match.
When the resting period is up, dust your bench and your hands with an ample amount of flour and turn the dough out onto the bench. Simply fold the dough in thirds, turn it 90 degrees, then fold the dough in thirds again. Then form the dough in a ball by tucking the edges of the dough underneath until you’ve got a nice skin on the top of the dough. Spread out one of your towels and dust it with a little cornmeal. Place the dough on the towel seam side down, dust it with a little more flour, and cover the whole thing with the other towel. Let it rise for 2 more hours.
Because of my poor time planning and easy distractibility, I was unable to let my dough rise for the full 2 hours. I set mine aside for about 50 minutes. The final product was a little more dense than I would have liked, but it was still delicious. I’m certain that if I had allowed it to rise the full 2 hours, it would have been perfect.
About 30 minutes before the final rise is complete, put the terra cotta pot inverted over the saucer (like in the picture) into a COLD oven and preheat the oven to 450 degrees. I will take a moment to remind you AGAIN that you should never rely on your oven’s thermometer to be accurate. Spend the $10 and get yourself a little oven thermometer. You’ll be glad you did.
When the time comes to bake the bread, open the oven, remove the terra cotta pot, and set it aside. (ON A HOT PAD, PLEASE! YOU’LL MELT YOUR COUNTERS OTHERWISE!) Remove the top towel from the bread, then slide your hand under the bottom towel and pick up the dough ball. Turn the dough upside down and place it in middle of the saucer. For those of you keeping track, that means that the seam side will now be facing up. It’ll look a little strange, but that’s fine. Replace the pot on the saucer and close the oven. Let the bread bake for 30 minutes.
After 30 minutes, remove the pot and let the bread continue to brown for another 10-30 minutes. Remove from the oven and allow to cool at least a little bit.
Cut, slather with homemade peach jam, prepare to meet your maker in ecstasy.
Now, I want to point out that this is a long post with VERY detailed instructions. Much like my post about the Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies (which BTW, has driven more traffic to my blog than anything I’ve ever written except my post about mommy bloggers) I wanted to be very specific with the instructions, even though the actual application of those instructions is quite simple. Give it a try.
By the way, if you’re not particularly thrilled about the idea of having a terra cotta flower pot sitting around in your kitchen, don’t forget that the saucer can be used in the same way a pizza stone is. Great for cookies, pizzas, and you can also use the whole pot for slow-roasting meats. (You’ll just want to use a glass dish inside of the pot to hold the juices).
So, that’s the awesomeness of no-knead bread. Thanks to the New York Times for the basic recipe, and to Alton Brown for the understanding of the science. And now, I’m off to make a grilled peanut butter and banana sandwich with cinnamon and brown sugar on homemade bread. The King still lives!
One of the worst trends ever to be foisted upon the American consciousness is the lo-carb, no-carb Atkins nonsense. Besides being entirely contrary to tens of thousands of years of nutritional evolution in humans, the whole no-carb craze has one completely fatal flaw. BREAD IS AWESOME. I have a co-worker whose doctor suggested to her that she stop eating wheat and gluten products because she might be allergic. My response to that? "Well, you just need to tell that doctor to go to Hell." If I had to choose between eating bread and dying from an allergic reaction or not eating bread and living until the age of 150, I’d be calling up funeral homes. Life without bread is not a life worth living. Celiac Disease be damned.
You see, there are few things in this world better than bread. Now, I’m not talking about your standard grocery store bread, but real, honest-to-goodness, made by hand bread. (As a side note: know how to tell if you have good bread or not? Is your bread sold in a plastic bag? If the answer to that question is yes, then it’s not good bread. It’s that simple!) I spent my life eating mass-produced bread. I know better than anyone what that spongy, slimy mess tastes (or more accurately, doesn’t taste) like. I grew up thinking that the way to tell if a loaf of bread was fresh was to squeeze it.
I know that I was not alone in such an upbringing. Many of us were. And we can’t blame our mothers. My mom had quite enough on her hands, thank you very much, without having to worry about making fresh, homemade bread three times a week for her family. (Which is too bad, because my mom’s homemade bread was pretty good most of the time.) For a while, I used to bake bread regularly, and I loved the final product. I did not, however, love the bread making process. Hours and hours of kneading, forming loaves, punching down, re-kneading…It’s just so not worth it.
Well, I came across this recipe from the New York Times website recently, and figured I’d give it a try. I’d seen something similar on the best food TV show in the world, Good Eats, and figured if it was good enough for AB, it was good enough for me. You don’t have to knead the dough at all, which is great, but you do have to let it rise for 12-18 hours. I had started my dough this morning at 9AM. I figured I would let it rise for 12 hours, then bake it off late at night, and have it cooled down and ready to eat by morning.
There were a couple of problems with this train of thought:
1. Yes, you have to let it rest for 12 hours, but then you have to form the dough into a ball and let it rise another 2 hours. Apparently, in addition to being unable to read my own writing for typos and grammatical errors, I’m incapable of reading a recipe thoroughly.
2. Letting bread sit for 12 hours would not be a problem for me if I didn’t have a tendency to be a) easily distracted and b) forgetful. So, when 11:00 rolled around, I wandered into the kitchen to get a drink before bed and noticed a whole bowl of bread dough that had been rising since 9AM. Oops.
So, it’s now 11:47, and I’ve got a loaf of bread rising on the stove. The oven is preheating to 450 degrees, and at midnight, I’m going to put the somewhat incompletely risen loaf of bread in the oven to bake for 30 minutes. This just goes to show you how much I love bread. I will be baking a loaf at 12:30 with the full knowledge that I didn’t follow the recipe and that it probably won’t turn out well. Ah well. C’est la vie, eh?
Besides, what better midnight snack than a piping hot loaf of (probably too dense) bread slathered with real butter and a heaping tablespoon of homemade peach jam. Suck it, Cheetos!
I’ll let y’all know how it turned out…but probably not until tomorrow.
Well, here’s a shocker! I’m actually updating my resolutions BEFORE the end of the month. I figure that the month is almost over, and I’ve been sitting in front of my computer for 15 minutes trying to think of something to blog about while I block all of my friends who use Farmville or Petville on Facebook. And since I’ve blocked all of them now, I might as well delve into these.
1) Self Control – Money
So, I think I did pretty well on this in February. I spent a lot of money, but its use had been planned in advance, so there was very little spur of the moment purchasing. I managed to talk myself out of stuff that I talked myself into "needing" and I managed to save about $900 last month AND pay off some of my debts. I did buy my bed, the sound treatment for my new recording booth, and a couple of other small little things, but those were from my tax return. So, overall, not amazing, but not
2) Experience New Things
I didn’t experience much in February other than a crushing sense of futility about it all. But that’s not particularly new. Um. Yeah.
3) Lose 20 Pounds
So, last year, I started dieting and working out in December, immediately after Christmas. I did really well for about a month, losing about 13 pounds in just a few weeks. Then, about the end of January and through the middle of February, I was packing up, moving, and unpacking in my new apartment. During that time, I didn’t have the time or desire to cook, and so I didn’t. I got out of the habit of eating healthily, and ended up never getting back into. I managed to gain back all the weight over the course of the next 10 months. Fast forward to 2010. Guess who is repeating history? I got out of the habit of healthy, and started doing the fast food thing again. I’m still down nearly 10 pounds from where I was at the beginning of the year, but I’ve got to get back on the wagon again. At least this year, I’ve got motivation in the form of a backpacking trip. By the way, I saw this shirt for sale on woot.com, but it’s out of print now. I think I need someone to have one printed for me for me for my birthday because it’s just 12 levels of awesome.
4) Be More Social
Enough Said.
5) Write Music
February was a good music month. I worked some on "Marginalized" again, but am still not happy with the sound of it. I’m really close those. I may have it ready this weekend. I also wrote my awesome 80s theme song for the podcast intro. Then, tonight, I wrote a whole song in about 45 minutes…which is unheard of for me. I recorded the piano and and a scratch vocal track for it, so I could remember exactly how it goes, and I am setting it aside for a few days to let it marinate for a while…I usually find a few ways to tweak the lyrics for the better if I leave it alone for a few days. But, for those keeping track, that’s 2 new songs written so far in 2010, with another song half-written that I like parts of, but not the whole thing, so I’m still trying to find something in there.
I’ve also enjoyed playing around in my new dedicated studio again. I’m even actually considering offering my services to my old boss at the Show Trax company for a little extra scratch on the side to do the sequencing…but I haven’t figured out if I could do that without stress…and I don’t think I can, so I’m not entirely sure.
6) Get in Shape
See "Lose 20 Pounds." Dairy Queen + Physical Stasis = Not In Shape.
7) Be More Giving
Not to well on this one either. Still having a hard time translating the abstract idea into actual practice. And honestly, for some reason, I just don’t think of this one much when I’m not writing these resolution reviews. It’s one of the downfalls of being a selfish SOB.
8) Get to Bed Earlier
I’m going to call this one a big old win. I’m getting to bed much earlier…usually well before Midnight most nights. Even on the weekends. I just don’t see the need to stay up late anymore. And since I changed my schedule so I can’t come home and take a nap during my lunch break every day, I’m a little more worn out by the time I get to the end of the day.
9) Take LOTS of pictures
Well, I did fill up my 16 gig memory card for the first time…I also used said camera to take some video which, if you’re a loyal reader, you’ve already seen. I still feel like I need to do better. This weekend, I’m thinking of taking Luke on the ferry over to Bainbridge Island or Bremerton and walking around a little bit to take some pictures. So, I may get to use my camera then. We shall see.
10) El Learno La Espanol
This one hasn’t been touched. Although, I am actually learning SOMETHING. It’s just not Spanish. I signed up for a really cool website, Lynda.com, which has tons on video tutorials on all kinds of complicated software packages (Photoshop, Illustrator, etc.) I signed up mainly to take their Quickbooks courses, so I can learn to better track our spending for Open Book Audio. Because this year, we’re going to start making some money (dammit!). After that, I’ll probably take some of their courses on Photoshop so I have a better understanding of how to make the photos that I process look better. So, if you lump all my learning efforts under this option (which I may just do because, hey, they’re my resolutions), then I didn’t do so poorly. If you’ve got your mind stuck on the fact that I didn’t learn Spanish this month, you can just suck it.
So there you go. February…it’s a wash. Some I did well on; others, not so much. But at least I’m starting to resolve. Or is that dissolve. I forget.
So, as many of you probably know, just recently, a group of popular singers got together to remake the old Michael Jackson & Lionel Richie song "We Are the World" in an effort to raise money for Haiti…a laudable goal. However, the resulting product was…well…judge for yourself.
First, for reference sake, the original:
Then, by comparison, the remake. (You’ll have to fast forward to about 1:30 to get into the actual video and past the telemarketing)
Wow. Just wow.
Both casts had groups of people who could actually sing well, and some who couldn’t. (Bob Dylan? Really?) But at least the ones who couldn’t sing were actually talented musicians and songwriters. But the balance between the two is way off.
Let’s look at the list of really talented singers…whether or not you like their work, you can’t deny that they can really sing:
| Old Cast:
Lionel Richie |
New Cast:
Celine Dion |
I was going to list the really bad singers, from each one, but I realized that I don’t know 80% of the bad singers from the newer version.
But to really tell the quality of the productions apart, look at what happens when everyone is singing. 1984’s Quincy Jones was able to wrangle a room full of egos into singing together, blending, and not trampling all over the song. 2010’s Quincy Jones is apparently too old and enfeebled to wrangle a room full of far-less-talented, but far larger egos into any sort of cohesive unit. It’s like everyone in the room decided that they were going to sing a solo, dammit, even if it didn’t fit, stepped on someone else, or just plain sounded bad.
And then look at the folks in the chorus of the new version who didn’t get to sing solos: Brandy, Natalie Cole, Harry Connick Jr., India Arie, Gladys Knight, Katharine McPhee, Jordin Sparks, Robin Thicke, Rob Thomas, Ann, Brian, and Nancy Wilson.
Also, the 1985 version didn’t need autotune. Can someone please explain to me why, in the name of all that’s good and holy, they let Lil’ Wayne and T-Pain "sing?" If you can’t sing without autotune, then don’t sing. Don’t even come to the studio. It was just painful. And what’s with that moron, Wyclef Jean, who doesn’t even try to sing, but just scream-yodels the sustain of every single note. Or was that Akon? I can’t tell. (I didn’t mind the "rap" in the middle of the new version, but the rest of it…disaster.)
25 years later, and I was able to watch the original version of this song and recognize almost every single one of the performers, despite the fact that the original was recorded when I was only seven years old. I didn’t know who most of these people were then. But nearly every single one of them went on to have long, successful careers. Many of them still have decent careers…those who aren’t dead, anyway. Many could easily be considered musical legends. I don’t even know who 2/3rds of the performers are in the new version, but I’m fairly certain that Miley Cyrus, Julio Iglacias, Lil-Wayne, or Nicole Scherizingeramalamadingdong McTrashyPants from the Pussycat Dolls won’t still be performing 20 years from now the next time they remake this song.
Musically, there’s just no comparison. It’s amazing. 25 years of absolutely stunning development in studio technology, and instead of getting better, we’ve just flushed an entire generation of musical talent down the drain thanks to Autotune.
Hey 2010 cast of "We Are the World," I appreciate your intent, I really do. But that craptastic version of a not-particularly-great song to begin with isn’t going to get me to open up my wallet for Haiti. I think I’ll just go and download Jennifer Hudson’s performance from the telethon instead. At least girlfriend actually knows how to sing.
Warning: this will be one of those self-reflective, contemplative, and a little depressed posts that crop up every now and again. If this doesn’t interest you, move along. Nothing to see here.
I had been looking forward to this weekend a great deal. Work for the last several weeks has been very demanding. I’ve been spending my time putting out fires, trying to fix problems, and dealing with the standard intra-office politics that plagues every single organization ever created by mankind. My weekends have been refuges for me. I’ve been able to relax, get away, do fun things, spend money, and generally enjoy myself thoroughly. So, after a particularly stressful week, I walked out of work on Friday ready for the weekend.
It was, to be blunt, disappointing.
The thing is that there is no reason it should have been. My weekend was spent much the same way as past weekends have been for months and months. I watched TV, played video games, went grocery shopping, grabbed some fast food, worked in the studio on some music, worked on an audiobook, surfed the web, and played with/walked the dog. I got a new bed delivered. I made rice pudding for the first time ever. (But without raisins, so it was actually good.)
But it’s 10:30 on a Sunday night, and I’m low.
When you’re young, you chart your life by the things that haven’t happened to you yet; by the things that you still have coming up. You look forward to starting school, going to Jr. High, going to your first dance (at the age of 14, if your Mormon), going to high school, going on your first day (at 16), graduating high school, going to college, graduating from college, getting a job. But I feel like that’s where it ends for me. (And let’s be honest…I didn’t even get half of the things I just listed off.) Most people get married, have kids, and then get to look forward to their kids’ milestones as much as their own, plus the additional milestone of being able to have the kids fly the nest and re-explore life as a single person. I, on the other hand, look at the remainder of my life and realize that my next milestone is retirement…which means that I’ve got 40 years of working jobs I don’t particularly care for in order to retire with enough money to live. Assuming that I don’t die of a heart attack in the 40s because of all the junk food I eat. Or get sick or injured. And heaven forbid that I spend the next 40 years working and retire only to find out that a) I’m too old to actually do anything I want to do or b) I don’t have anyone to do it with.
I spent this weekend doing the things that I wanted to do…and I largely enjoyed them. But I don’t feel like I’m working toward anything anymore. Even my resolutions seem forced…something to be working on for the sake of working on something…not because I really want to, or because I’m working toward something that’s really important to me.
For most of my life, there was always a path laid out before me. Granted, it was a path that I could not have followed, but at least there were milestones along the way. Once I finally started trying to chart my own future, I’ve come to realize that I don’t know where to go. I can’t be the good little Mormon boy with the wife and three adorable children, serving in Boy Scouts and teaching the Deacon’s Quorum. I can’t be the raging queen, out dancing at the clubs every night and hooking up with every ‘mo who crosses my path. I’m just stuck in between. And the thing about the middle ground? It’s in the middle. It’s bland, mediocre, unremarkable. It’s the Land of "Meh." It’s like a saw a fork in the road, and instead of taking the one "less travelled by," I just set up camp in the fork and watch people taking one road or the other while I sit there and try to learn the guitar or record an audiobook.
I’m not sure what the answer is…or if there even is an answer. And I feel rather disingenuous whining about feeling rudderless when I have friends and family who are struggling with real problems. I just wish I had something in my life that was driving me toward some greater end. A purpose, a milestone.
Or, maybe I should just start picking out retirement homes now…
So, remember when I moved into my new apartment three weeks ago? (Man, it seems like about a year ago). Well, things are all put away, wired, hung (mostly) and set up correctly in the apartment now. So, I decided that, rather than using my Overly Expensive Camera™ to take pictures which I would then have to sort through, develop, and edit before uploading and captioning, I would use said Overly Expensive Camera™ to take a video which I could narrate and then post. Plus, I wanted to experiment with the video portion of my camera a bit. (It actually makes me want to film another mockumentary like the one I did when I was at Tuacahn in the summer of 2003 that is perhaps one of the most brilliant things I’ve ever done artistically in my life even if I say so myself.
Anyway, below is my short virtual tour of the new apartment. Please excuse some of the minor clutter and remember, I am a single man who lives alone. When company comes, I don’t leave the toilet seat up. I swear.
Tour of my new apartment from Matt Armstrong on Vimeo.
So, for those of you who don't know, I do a couple of podcasts for my company, Open Book Audio. One podcast is a weekly installment of my recording of "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" by Mark Twain. I release a couple of chapters of the book on a weekly basis. It's a free audiobook!
I also do the fortnightly Open Book Audio podcast with my partner, Andrew, and we talk about audiobooks in general. We also have samples of other audiobooks, giveaways, and an occasional epic rant or two.
You may also remember that one of my resolutions for the year is to get back into writing music more often. I haven't been writing much lately, and wanted to get back into it. Over the last week or so, I've been writing and producing some music that I can use for the intro and outro music for the OBA podcast, and in doing so, I realized something: I've missed my calling in life.
You see, I started trying to write something that was like the theme to NBC Nightly News or the Olympics or something. But as I got going along, i realized that I was being taken on a journey through musical time, back to that magic era where all television shows had immensely awesome theme songs–the 80s and early 90s. (My love of the awesome TV Theme Song has been well documented here.) Before I knew it, I had written an intro theme that was so quintessentially 1989 that I may have squealed with delight…like a big old 'mo at a Barbra Streisand concert. It wasn't want I had set out to write, but it was SO much more awesome. I was BORN to write TV theme songs for 80s and 90s television shows. I was just born about 20 years too late.
So, sit back, grab your slap bracelets, jelly shoes, and hypercolor clothes. I am proud to present, with no further adieu, my piece de resistance, the Theme to the Open Book Audio Podcast. Bask in the 80s!
