You're the Indian in the cougar's nest

Why do people always seem to post more entries in the middle of the week? I have all of these posts to go through, but I can pretty much guarantee you that, once I finish reading them, there will be hardly any more posts until the middle of next week. You'd kind of think people would update MORE often over the weekend, but oh well. Let's get this show on the road, as they say.

I got the Rilo Kiley album More Adventurous today. I had wanted to get The Execution of All Things, since that has the two songs of theirs that got me interested in the band in the first place (the title track and "A Better Son/Daughter"); but I wanted to use the Circuit City gift card that my brother had given me for my birthday, and the local Circuit City only had Adventurous. I still have $1.23 on the gift card, so I guess I'll use that next time I buy something there. Anyway, I like the album. The only song on it I already knew was "Portions For Foxes," and that and the title song are probably my two favorites. There are some other pretty cool tracks, though. "I Never" is country-ish, which is pretty cool. I'd seen mentions in the past about Rilo Kiley having country influence, which kind of confused me, since the songs I'd heard were no more country than Antarctica. Now I suppose I know what they mean.

It seems like a while since I last got into a new band. I guess I did get into the Ditty Bops and the Dresden Dolls last year, but I'd like to expand my musical horizons a little more. Any suggestions?

Hmm, all three of the bands that I've mentioned so far in this entry have female vocalists. That's kind of cool, since my music collection around five years ago was made up pretty much entirely of male artists. Not that I'm officially pursuing an affirmative action policy in the music I listen to, but still.

And finally, to mention a band with a male vocalist, Hypnotic Clambake is having a clearance special on their albums. I already have all of them, so I'm not going to be taking advantage of it, but it sounds like an excellent deal for anyone who wants them and doesn't have them (which probably isn't anyone who'll be reading this, but I still wanted to spread the news).

I'm not a girl, not yet a woman

You know, I don't mind washing the dishes, but I hate drying. Am I alone in this? If so, maybe some of you should come over and help me out next time I do the dishes. {g}

Sometimes there's an entry with links or pictures or something that I want to come back to later, and I often forget. Now I think about it, though, I guess I could use the "memories" feature to keep those entries on file, couldn't I? I've never actually used that feature for what I assume is its intended function, since I never think of it. Really, though, how am I to know what I'll be interested in remembering in the future?

I don't post all that many links in my own journal (well, aside from general links to band pages and such), but I couldn't let this pass. There's apparently a statue of Britney Spears giving birth. On this Frank Black Forum thread, which was where I learned about it, a few people pointed out that it really looks nothing like Britney.

A mention of the standardized test system of education made me want to say something about the topic, but really, what more can I say than "standardized tests suck"? And I don't say this out of bitterness; I actually did pretty well on such tests. I'm not sure I would have gotten into all the colleges I applied for if I hadn't gotten a good SAT score. But that doesn't make me smart (as I'm sure you can all tell ;)). I think the problem is that many of those in charge of the educational system want to make it as simple and cookie-cutter-ish as possible. Administering standardized tests as a measure of how well students learn things means you don't have to consider how people learn differently, as well as how some people just aren't good at taking tests. Obviously, the country has neither the money nor the manpower to provide as many teachers as there are learning styles in a school district, but it often seems like they're not even trying. Some people would probably argue that they do this on purpose, since our educational system isn't supposed to turn out intelligent, free-thinking individuals, but rather cubicle serfs and factory drones. But I don't know. It's not a subject where I'm that knowledgeable. All I know is that standardized tests suck. {g}

( Lesbian quiz and 30-question survey )

little_octagon and travspence both did this meme:

"When you see this, post the lyris to an anti-war song in your LJ."

The first song I thought of was actually XTC's "Reign Of Blows," which is kind of weird, considering that I don't even LIKE that song that much. The mix sounds sloppy to me, and the lyrics are difficult to understand. (Maybe it sounds better on the remastered CD of The Big Express? I wouldn't know.) Those difficult-to-understand lyrics are actually pretty good, though.

( The lyrics )

Assuming nothing interesting happens anytime soon, my next post will probably have something to do with song titles.