The Best Stuff

Caro, please don't tell.

I was in the grocery store yesterday and there was a Dido song playing, and I was thinking to myself, "this is certainly not one of the best songs ever written". A couple days before that, Boys of Summer had been playing as I was being electrocuted in the physiotherapist's office, and I had the exact opposite thought.

So, I think it's time to talk about some of the best stuff. Feel free to pitch in.

Best Songs (at the moment....)
Boys of Summer (Don Henley)
I Hope You Dance (Lee Ann Womack with a great backing band)
most of the Pornografitti album (Extreme)
With or Without You, Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking for, Where the Streets Have No Name (U2)
Anything that doesn't have Sean Paul in it

Best Band Names
Chixdigit
Marky Mark & The Funky Bunch (thanks to Erin for the reminder)
Monday Night Band

Best Delivery of the Word "Tea?" (as an invitation)
British Nathan

Best Foods
Steak
Nat's trifle
Anything deep-fried

Best Sound
The little chick's laugh

Best Articles of Clothing
Depends heavily on the situation, but, in general, a great pair of jeans
Big Red Coat

Best Tire
Front driver's side

Best Picture
The next one...


More to come. Hope you're all well!

I Want (Part IV)

To run.

To sing like I don't have neighbours.

A great cigar.

The best shave ever.

To love with nothing held back.

To hit my snare so hard you blink.

To be pure.

To laugh with you.

To wear fun shoes more often.

To hear my little chick say "more?" in that beautiful, we've-been-playing-so-hard-I-can-barely-breathe voice.

Wisdom.

I Want (Part III)

To be dressed by Tom Ford.

To see my little girl's smile.

To always live with passion.

Armrests on every chair.

To get lost in beauty.

To be thankful in everything.

Fewer pixels, and more sunburns.

To remember more.

To sing her to sleep.

To show you what I see.

To be strong, but not tough.

Going Home

I leave tomorrow. It will be nice to be home. It will be wonderful to - soon - see my little chick again. But it's going to be hard to leave Stockholm. So, I pause to reflect.

Things I like here:

• Fewer people using their cell phones as stereos on public transport. And, as a result, a much lower desire to feed people their own phones.
• When I'm out walking and I'm not taking pictures, I am usually still looking at people. And, when I look at people, I make eye contact. And people here look back. And here's the cool part - they smile. I couldn't be happier.
• There are a lot of red shoes. Not a lot, I guess, but relatively more. Red shoes are good.
• There are beautiful children playing, which makes me almost unbearably happy and sad at the same time.
• It feels safe and orderly, but not as though a 70 year-old Swiss woman is about to pop out and hit you on the head with a broom, if you know what I mean.
• I saw a woman with her 3 kids carrying hockey sticks. Hockey sticks are good.
• I think Swedish is a cool language. My Swedish friends had told me that it was like Swiss German. Sure, there's a little more up and down than English, but it doesn't sound like anyone is about to cough up their spleen.
• There is a certain agelessness to a lot of the women here. I'm crap at guessing ages, which is why, if you ask me to guess yours, I will just say, "I don't know". And then I'll wait for you to talk about something else. But here, it seems even harder than usual. There are a lot of women who, I get the feeling, are somewhere between 25 and 40, but they could tell me anything in that range and I would believe them.
• The city is small enough that there are some people I've seen several times, and I think that's pretty cool, for only having been here a week.

Things I don't like:

• Smoking isn't allowed inside, except in my friend Johan's apartment, where it's mandatory.
• Some women are not just wearing leggings under shorts, but shiny leggings. Like super-hero costume kind of shiny.
• It's about 9 CHF just to take one ride on the metro. That's just way too much.

Something I've been thinking about:

I've seen a lot of parents of fairly young children who are tired of walking, who seem to be dealing with it poorly. They either just have the kid, crying, trailing along at the end of their arm, or, I've seen the family actually leave, go into a building a 100m away and wait. Eventually, they came back for the little boy (who was sitting, rather resolutely, where they had left him - seems this had happened before). Here's what I think.

Maybe those 3 year-old legs are just tired. Maybe you skipped naptime. Maybe he's hungry. So maybe you should carry him for a while.

And, even more to the point, maybe she just wants to know she is loved and valued. I don't know, but perhaps if those parents would just stop and crouch down and say, "You're tired, aren't you? Me too. I love you, and we have a little more walking to do before we can stop. Shall we sit here together for a minute before we go on?" there would be a lot less crying now and a lot fewer feelings of abandonment to work through later on. Maybe.

Anyways, time to pack!

I'm Ready For My Close-Up

I was talking with Science Nathan on the train ride back from Milan about an idea for a film. He started talking about what the real environment at CERN is like, in contrast to the Dan Brown-ish view that most people have of it. And I thought, wouldn't it be fun to show that like a wild-life documentary?

It remains to be seen if it will work. I'd love to work on the script, but am a little short in knowing the intricacies of what makes the world of physicists spin, so Nathan needs to be the man for that. And it may be a little tough for me to get into CERN to get any video footage to use. Nathan is there, but it's not entirely clear how free he would be to shoot or, perhaps more to the point, edit the material into a rather non-discovery-channel-ish kind of thing. I mean, as a rule of thumb, it's a good idea not to piss off people who know how to make nuclear kinds of things.

So it got me thinking... what other "species" would be a good subject for a fake documentary film?

Already done:

• Rock musicians (Spinal Tap)
• Dog lovers (Best In Show)
• Amateur theatre people (Waiting For Guffman)
• Karaoke singers (Reverb, a flim in which I invested and, sadly, have yet to see)
• Porta-potty attendants (Ralph? I can't remember the nane, but it's Australian and it's fun)
• Cops (Super-Troopers)
• Conservatives (anything by Michael Moore)

Probably wouldn't work:

• French farmers/Italian rail workers (would probably lead to an indefinitely extended strike bring Europe to the point of economic collapse)
• Islamic fundamentalists (can you say "get a sense of humor, boys"?)
• Rap musicians (how do you parody something that's already so.... well, a parody?)
• Authors (the film would be okay, but the book would be WAY better)

So, that leads me to the final, and most important list - begging to be done:

• Physicists (come on, Nathan - what's the worst that could happen, other than to your career?)
• Airport security agents
• Guys who sell consumer electronics, especially car stereos
• Comic-book collectors
• Soccer players (for some reason, I think the Italian ones would offer the greatest possibilities for crafting a compelling story)

Any other suggestions? Who wants to join me in Cannes next year?

The Next Ten (Or Seven For Josh)

It was going to be the next five, but it took about 15 seconds to pull #6 off the shelf. Here are the next ten books I plan to read.

1. Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference? (Yancey). This has been a major area of interest for me for a while, and this is the third-last book that I want to really get an understanding of before gathering my thoughts and trying to build a cohesive picture of what prayer is, how it is designed to work, and what it is meant to accomplish. It will be a life-long study, but I am getting to see the first chapter a little more clearly.

2. The Brera Gallery, Official Guide (Touring Club Italiano). Since I'm heading to Milano next weekend with half a dozen friends, I want to review a bit about what we're going to be able to see. It's a great museum, with some gorgeous works by Cima, Bellini, Matnegna, and Crivelli (one reproduction of which is hanging in my living room), as well as a bunch of stuff from the 17-19th centuries as well.

3. Letters To Malcolm (C. S. Lewis). His last book, and one in which he writes about various aspects of prayer. I expect it to be exceptional.

4. The Living Christ (Fickett). A book in which he celebrates the lives of contemporary people who are intent on being the expression of Christ's love. This one may be a bit of a challenge for me... I'm quite sure it will be much more heart than head, which I don't mind but am not used to reading. If it's good, I think it's going to be inspiring. If it's bad, it will be dire.

5. Emotional Intelligence (Goleman). Cause I could use a bit more.

6. Understanding And Crafting The Art Of The Mix (Moylan). Because I want to create incredible music, and I realize that my ears are only going to take me so far on their own. This one is heavy - it's a text book - but I believe there is gold inside. Gold records, baby! Yeah! *making "I'm shooting you" motion while winking*

7. What A Difference A Daddy Makes (Leman). I've read this before, but want to go through it regularly to be the best father I can to my little chick.

8. It's Not About Me (Lucado). I have the good fortune of having already learned that. I think this will be a good second step.

9. Essay Collection: Faith, Christianity, and the Church (C. S. Lewis). There is so much wisdom in this book... every time I open it I am astounded. On the short list for now are the essays on prayer, but I'm sure that my eye will wander once I start, in the most wonderful kind of way.

10. The Art Of Mixing (Gibson). This is a particularly interesting book on recording and mixing: he takes aspects of sound and represents them as balls of various densities (indicating clarity/presence) and sizes (indicating frequency range, EQ, and effect) on a three-dimensional stage (indicating pitch [up/down], pan [left/right], and volume [front/back]). Should provide a very interesting alternative way to thinking about creating music.

I guess some of these - well, all of them - will have a fairly limited appeal. Still, I think they will all be good for me. Anyone else want to contribute a list? Let's see what I can ask you about next time we talk...

I Want (Part II)

To make you think.

To be able to tell if a suit is warm or cool gray before I get it home.

To move mountains.

To make my little girl giggle until she can barely breathe.

To cook for you.

To smile more... but not too much.

To keep my friends.

To make you feel safe.

To win at poker again.

To write a book.

I've Decided

I had tried leaving it open for a few years, but I think I have come to the point of reaching a firm decision. I don't think that rock climbing is going to be for me. I'm not opposed to other people doing it, and I don't find the thought particularly scary, but I'm just not interested. It's been weighing on me, and I'm glad to have reached a little internal resolution about it.

Other things I still want to do: skydive, swim with sharks (but the cheating way, in a cage), explore Hong Kong, get custom-made shoes, see Run DMC, learn to surf

Other things that are just not looking like they're going to make the list: base jumping, bungee jumping, owning an apple product, getting a piercing

Still undecided on: skiing. I've been pretty happy not doing it, but will likely pick it up again in order to let my little chick learn

Top Seven U2 Songs

At the last Angry Guys' Night, we did a lot of U2. Mixed in with some bbq'ing, some poker, a few cigars and (of course) the pedicures we went through Rattle & Hum, Zoo TV, and The Singles DVDs. At one point, as "Bad" was playing and I was entering a state of near-ecstasy, Josh commented that it was among his top 7 U2 songs.

Now I don't know about you, but I am used to people saying things like "that's the best beef and kidney pie I've ever eaten" or "that's got to be in the top 10 three-speed bicycles ever made" or things like that, but it is almost always limited to the top thing, in the top 5, top 10, or top 100.

Top 7?

So this one is for you to play along. In the interest of brevity (something dear to my heart, as you know), but to make sure Josh can prove his point, we'll stick to top 7. I'll go first - and for me, I'm considering these as I remember them live, based primarily on how severe the chills are that they send down my spine:

1. Where The Streets Have No Name
2. With Or Without You
3. Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
4. Bad
5. Pride
6. Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses
7. Beautiful Day

...with Yahweh being a very close contender. Yeah, it's pretty predictable, but I am all about tradition. Who wants to play?

I Want (Part I)

To eventually have more posts than labels.

To show my little girl my Father's love.

To create music that takes your breath away.

To remember which direction I was going before I went into the building.

To dance.

To find the perfect sunglasses.

To learn to say goodbye.

To hear you laugh.

To appreciate what I have.

To be like salt.

To make eye contact.

To see Aerosmith.

To be honest.

To take your picture.


[EDIT] Just to avoid any confusion, wanting to create music that takes your breath away is not at all the same as wanting to remake the song, "Take My Breath Away" from the Top Gun soundtrack.