free as in blog

Wow, it really has been a while. I really need to put some stories up, so here goes.

I was in Kentucky a few weeks ago visiting Maker’s Mark. I highly recommend visiting if you like bourbon at all. The amount of detail you get and the kind of things you can see is quite impressive - our tour took us into the fermentation room where we were invited to taste the pre-fermented beer in various states, then got to walk down the bottling line and see where the bottles are hand-dipped in wax (okay, plastic).

I brought my GPS with us (a Tomtom that I really like) and had directions from the nice Makers Mark people. At one intersection, the GPS had us take a left. The printed directions had us take a right. We split the difference and went into the McDonalds at the corner for some food. While we’re ordering, I ask the woman behind the counter “Can I get to route 245 if I take a right here?”. She says “No, you need to take a left”, then starts rattling off about a minute worth of ‘turn left’ and ‘turn right’ and ‘then you’ll see the krogers’. I’m now admittedly lost and just figure I’ll use the printed directions (they wouldn’t guide me wrong, right?). At this point, the guy behind me, who is busy talking on his cell phone, chimes in with “Or he can take a right here at the intersection and it’ll take him straight to 245″. The woman pauses and says “Oh yeah”.

For me, Christmas is one of those strange seasons. On the one hand, it’s a joyous time where the best of fellow man can shine through the dark night. Smiles on children’s faces, families together and enjoying each other’s company, seeing the world anew after it snows, etc.

There’s also this under part. The darkness that the light has to shine through. Think more melancholy. Not necessarily evil, but maybe sad (my wife may say ‘moody’). Days are shorter, uncertainty about the year ahead, looking back on the year that just passed, parties to attend, cards to write, presents to buy, and dang it’s cold out.

For some reason, the two work together well. Maybe the pagans that came up with the solstice and the Christians that adopted Dec 25 were on to something by inserting a holiday here.

Anyway, there’s two CDs that for some reason define Christmas for me, at least the season as a whole. They combine both of these parts together in a unique way.

First is the soundtrack to Charlie Brown Christmas. Guaraldi was able to put together a number of really fun and happy tunes (most notably the theme you think of when you think of Peanuts), along with some rather haunting tunes like the title of this article. He was even able to put the two together into a single song in his version of ‘O Tannenbaum’. Don’t bother with the 40th anniversary edition - get the original. You can usually find it in a Starbucks.

The other is John Denver and the Muppets. My parents had this as a record for probably 20 years now, and I was able to find a CD of it a few years ago with all the tracks (there was a version in 2000 that was missing a number, go find the one with 13 tracks on it!). I normally don’t listen to John Denver, but he was able to insert the haunting parts in amongst the Muppet fun you expect from when Jim Henson still roamed the earth.

Honorable mention (for Christmas Day itself) goes to this batch of other records my parents had that were sold by Firestone in the early to mid 60s. They’re more religious and celebratory, which would be almost unheard of now, but hey, that’s progress(?). I found a number on eBay a few years ago and copied them to CD - hey, maybe I can use that to get back to the actual intent of this and write technical stuff again.

I’m not sure how I thought of this new name, but whatever. Noone else was using the name, so I’m still relatively unique. I really should be putting random things here instead of hackrag.

I’m not sure why, but I’m really digging Hilltop Hoods.  Let me first say it’s Australian Rap.

Yes, you heard right.

Australian Rap.

To verify my brain isn’t doing something dumb to me, I had a friend listen to a track and he concurred - sounded like early 80s rap.  Only they have Australian accents. I like early rap: nice sounds, vinyl scratching, social statements. Especially great are Clown Prince, Stopping All Stations, and Breathe, all on “The Hard Road” which was released last year.  Go, find, listen, enjoy.

I’m sitting here at Logan, with proof that my laptop can get to the Internet via my Treo.  Even found a couple of electrical outlets to keep everything charged.

I hate security.  This is the first time I’ve flown in over a year.  Maybe it’s not security itself, but the fact that the rules are so random from airport to airport.  Manchester, NH allows you to bring a sealed bottle of soda or water with you through security.  Logan doesn’t.  Albany airport doesn’t make you take off your shoes when you go through security (they actually yelled at me when I did take my shoes off).  Logan does.
Wasn’t the TSA created to standardize these rules?  Maybe this is all some plan to make us feel safer my randomizing the rules so ‘the bad guys’ can’t use any one scheme to kill us all.

Ah well.  A few hours from now, I’ll be in Phoenix,and in about 24 hours I’ll be on the south rim of the grand canyon.  I’d like to think that shuffling around without shoes or jacket makes up for it, but I’m not sure.