Nonsense, Drivel, and Balderdash

I quit my teaching job a week ago. When I decided to stay in spain for another year, I did it with the idea that I would be teaching english part time, as a means to pay off my living expenses whilst I worked on my music. But over the past couple of months I have started to have throat problems. Slowly I have begun to lose my voice a bit. The doctor isn't quite sure what the deal is, though we both suspect acid reflux is burning away at my throat. Regardless of what it may be, teaching english wasn't helping. I spent quite a few hours a day talking, projecting my voice loudly, and it was becoming quite uncomfortable, bordering on painful. At the end of a day of teaching, I would get home disheartened and tired. I became quite despondent at the prospect that what was meant to be a means to an end was actually getting in the way of my goal. The job I depended on to live was preventing me from following my reason for living. But I was stuck. You can't just quit your job to pur...

Winter is almost here. You can never tell for sure at this time of the year. One day it is warm, the next it is cold. But for the past couple of weeks, the Fall has been wrestling, and losing, to Winter. The mornings start out very cold, and slowly the day starts to warm a bit as the sun comes out. But the Cold stands patiently in the shadows, hidden from the sun's warmth, waiting for you to walk into the shade of a building or tree to show you how cold the air really is and remind you to bring a scarf. Today was especially chilly. Even our apartment made me wrap up a little tighter. It also made me close some of the windows that we had wide open. Our whole building is heated with a giant coal furnace in the basement that tends to turn our humble abode into a living inferno. We balance this out by opening windows. It is a terrible waste of energy, but we have no control over the heating. I read that madrid still has over 2000 buildings running their heating off coal. It is terribly...

Some people are Assholes .

Sometimes you just have to pay respect where it is due. I have some pretty damn clever friends out there. Some of them have blogs. Miriam's blog always brings a wry smile to my face. Ed's is worth its weight it chuckles. Afshaan is a warm descriptive writer. Sradda's accounts of Nepal keep me going back. Daniel's blog engages the ear and the eye. Some of the blogs are give themselves to quoting better than others, but still. A few of these blogs have been linked-to on the right for a long time, others are elsewhere on the web (it is up to them if they wish to share their writings). So without further delay, here are some quotes from some of the blogs I frequent: ...The bad part about burns is that they keep hurting more and more. Other injuries, the initial pain tends to be worst and then it lessens. With burns you really have nothing to look forward to. It's like going to a really awful class on sanitation that will end in a career as a garbage man. Miriam Moser ...

So the stage was set. My friend, and flatmate, Dan thought that a Goth night sounded like fun. Then the word got out and a couple other's decided to join in. My first step was to prepare my Goth outfit. These vary more than you would think. You have the ones that are dressed like Victorian vampires, those that look like something from a Cure concert, and the cyber-Goths with their matrix-meets-a-rave look... and there are many more. But they all have some things in common: mostly, black, hair gel, and makeup. Now, I had quite a bit of black, but it was mostly of the formal variety: dress shirts, jackets and slacks. So I decided to go for the more "I just came from a funeral and I wasn't exactly a guest" look. Of course, I didn't have any makeup so I walked down the street to the nearest makeup store (there has got to be another name for those places) and checked it out. Now, the first thing I noticed is that I don't know the vaguest thing about makeup. Brands,...

And yet another reason why I love the king of spain . Lets face it, Hugo Chavez is probably one of the top 5 most irritating political figures of the past 25 years and sometimes I just wish someone would tell him to shut up. Here is the video

You know that one thing that sits in the back of your mind and crops up from time and says "you know, you really oughta get off your sweet sweet cheeks and do _________" ? For some people this could be "skydiving," or "see New England in the Fall" (worth it, by the way), or "learn French", or "mud wrestle a dogfish." Each person has their own dreams, some more grand than others. For me, one of my great desires was to go to a Goth Club. I don't know why, but those gloomy, dark clothed, pale faced, people have always fascinated me. They are, lets face it, a bit odd. But not that much when you think about it. Every subculture has their own philosophy whether or not their members realize it. Some are more obvious, like the Punk culture, which celebrates Anarchy and Rebellion. Or the Rastafarian movement, which actually has a religious side to it, mostly focused on Peace and Freedom. The Rap culture, which celebrates Power. The Indie roc...

Lately, I have been feeling much as Rat does in the 9th chapter of the Wind in the Willows. I'll explain. In that beautiful chapter of the book, Rat "was restless, and he did not exactly know why." Summer was over, fall was starting to show itself and the hints of winter that come with it. The banks of the river were thinning, the sounds of summer had fallen silent, the robin had showed up again, the large birds were "obedient to the peremptory call" to head south. The swallows tell him about their "stirring within ... a sweet unrest" and Rat realizes that he too is falling under its spell. I also have found that "that chord hitherto dormant and unsuspected" has been ringing in my head for months now. When I decided to stay in Madrid for another year I didn't count on two things: my trip back to boston, and a sore throat. I have recently, for the past month, since I started teaching, had a sore throat. It has put all my musical aspiratio...